


if i could fly

by thekardemomme



Category: SKAM (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Fairies, Fluff, Light Angst, M/M, Mutual Pining, Mythical Beings & Creatures
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-09
Updated: 2018-01-08
Packaged: 2019-01-31 04:26:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 27,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12674406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thekardemomme/pseuds/thekardemomme
Summary: Isak’s stranded in Oslo and Even takes him in, even though it’s against Isak’s number one rule: don’t interact with humans whatsoever.





	1. swim before you drown

Rain isn’t uncommon in Oslo, especially not in the autumn. Isak knows how to avoid it, he knows when to stay low and hidden, and he knows when the raindrops become dewdrops so he can flit out from underneath the toadstool he’d been hiding under. But this rain had come from nowhere, the dark clouds chasing him as he darts towards home, large and foreboding. He thinks he can make it to the tips of the trees just over on the horizon. It’s not much farther now.

He flies between street lamps and the bustling pedestrians on the cobblestone walkways, invisible to the naked eye due to the pure speed he’s going. He’s going to wear himself out, surely, but the incoming monsoon will give him plenty of time to rest his wings.

As he gets into the city, he flies upwards. Windows are lit up like chessboards, and Isak struggles not to stop and ogle a human from the perch of their windowsill. Isak’s always had a fascination with humans.

Much to Eskild’s chagrin, of course. Eskild was pretty lenient, always letting Isak fly around to his heart’s content, but he always enforces one rule: no contact with humans, whatsoever. It’s a bit like Harry Potter, Isak presumes. He can be around humans as long as he doesn’t use magic around them, except his whole body is magic so they can’t see any of it. He lives in the shadow of the trees for most of his day, and maybe that’s why he’s so obsessed with flying around Oslo whenever he can. Besides, he’s not been seen yet, so obviously he’s doing something right.

Hiding is exhausting. He hates it. He hates the constrictive confines of canopied trees and bunched up feathers and woven sticks, and he hates toadstools more than anything. Though that’s related to a trauma from a few years ago, when a particularly curious 4 year old human walked nearby him and he hid under a toadstool to avoid her. She’d become so entranced by the mushroom that she’d plucked it right out of the ground with Isak still clinging to the stem. He wasn’t caught that day, somehow, but he’s had a certain vendetta against mushrooms and children ever since.

His favorite part of the city is the street lamps, probably. Eskild had “affectionately” called him a moth a few times because of this fascination. Isak doesn’t approve of that nickname at all, of course, but Eskild is Eskild. What he says is law, and everyone else is helpless to convince him otherwise. Isak doesn’t approve, but he’s gotten used to it.

There’s a tall one on the corner of two desolate streets that he likes. It’s fancy, like it’s old, and there’s old buildings there too. Isak thinks they’re apartments, because he’s peeped in the windows a few times, particularly to watch the bottom floor window where a young girl always plays with her dolls. It makes Isak nostalgic for his own childhood. It also makes him sad, sometimes, when he wishes he was born a human. But then he flies or uses magic and remembers why being a fairy isn’t all that bad.

Today isn’t much different, despite the storm looming overhead. He flies towards the street light and then sits on top of it, watching the flicker of curtains in the windows, thinking of the intricate lives going on behind them. It’s something he’ll never be able to wrap his mind around, the idea that other people have lives as twisting and turning as his own, with backstories and families and a heaviness in their hearts that they hide from everyone else. In this moment, he’s watching the curtains move, and in this moment, behind the curtains, a couple could be discussing divorce. Or discussing marriage. Isak will never know who they are or what they’re doing, and they’ll never know Isak, but their lives will keep happening. The world keeps turning whether Isak is aware of its cogs and gears or not. Life doesn’t stop happening just because Isak isn’t there to see it. It’s a scary thing, sometimes. But for now, he’s just enthralled.

Too enthralled, perhaps. _Distracted_.

The first raindrop he feels plops down on top of his head, effectively soaking his hair and his upper body. He stands to fly away, to at least hide, but doesn’t get very far. In fact, he gets as far as the windowsill on the top floor of the building next to his favorite streetlight before his wings get hit and he’s left immobile.

He can already hear Eskild’s chastising.

“Fuck, fuck, shit, fuck,” Isak swears, kicking at the edge of the window and punching at the glass. The force of his fist against the glass doesn’t make much of a sound, but Isak keeps trying, like somehow he’ll be able to crack the shit out of it. “Fuck! I hate this shit, I’m such a dumbass! Fuck, shit, fuck, goddamn it!” He punches again, and then stumbles back, falling on his ass.

His knuckles are a little bruised afterwards, but the rest of him is going pale from the cold. He pushes himself into the corner and wraps his arms around his knees, shivering from the cold and mumbling small swears into his arms.

Eskild is going to be so pissed, Isak knows that already. He’s probably standing at the edge of the forest, hiding in a hole in a tree, scanning the field for signs of Isak. He’s probably worried sick, knows Isak got his dumbass stranded in the rain. And there’s no end to it in sight, so god knows how long Isak will be stuck here. It could be hours, even a day.

“Fuck!” Isak yells again, but he can’t hear himself say it over the loud squeak to his right. He turns and finds the window wide open, with a human head poking out of it, wide blue eyes staring right at him. Isak’s tiny heart stops right there in his chest.

He scrambles back, pressing himself further against the wall. There’s nowhere he can run, if he goes left he’ll fall five stories to the ground, and if he goes right, he’ll give himself over to the human. Behind him is nothing but stone. He wants to cry a bit, because this human is still staring at him, eyes wide and mouth wider.

“Um...” The human begins, and Isak’s fingers begin to tremble like they do when he gets nervous. “Do you want to come inside? The rain isn’t supposed to let up for quite some time, and I can’t imagine you’re particularly warm, sitting out here in the cold while you’re sopping wet.” When Isak doesn’t answer, the human keeps talking. “I won’t... I won’t hurt you, if that’s what you’re afraid of. You don’t even have to stay, if you don’t want to. I just heard something hitting the window and I thought it was heavy raindrops until I heard, you know, the swearing. And uh... you look cold? So... I figured maybe you’d want to come in and warm up.”

Isak blinks hard. Every instinct in his body is screaming at him to deny the offer, to risk death by jumping off this windowsill and trying to fly away if it means getting away from this human. He hears Eskild most of all, telling him horror stories of human-fairy interaction and how, historically, it never ends particularly well. But the tips of his toes are going a little numb and he’s tired of being soaking wet, so he pushes himself to his feet.

The human offers his palm, and Isak hesitantly steps into it, slow as molasses. He sits comfortably there, bare hands resting against the human’s rough callouses as he balances himself. The human brings him in and closes the window, latching it shut. He’s whisked off to a bathroom, small and painted white, freshly picked lilies sitting on the counter.

“Wait here a moment,” the human says, and sets Isak down before disappearing. Isak takes a look around, glimpses at himself in the mirror and rifles through the shit sitting on the counter. Toothpaste and shaving cream and gloss and acne cream. Isak knows what a toothbrush is, but nothing else rings any bells. He tries to twist the top off the tube of acne cream, but it’s too difficult for his small hands to do, even with all of his efforts.

“Fuck you, too, then,” Isak snaps, kicking the lid of the acne cream. The tube barely budges, and says nothing back. Isak glares at it.

When the human returns, he’s carrying a steaming teacup that’s just big enough for Isak to be able to fit in. It’ll be a tight squeeze, but Isak figures he can manage if he only submerges half of his body. He’ll need to keep his wings out of the water anyway, so maybe the size of the teacup was intentional, to make that easier on Isak. He’s not sure if this human knows that much about fairies, but he elects to believe that the human does and was considerate enough to help him out by getting him a cup slightly too small.

“If you give me your clothes, I’ll dry them,” the human offers. “I won’t look, I promise.” True to his word, he turns around and sticks his hand out. Isak tentatively undresses, placing his small clothing in the human’s fingers. The human disappears again, and Isak climbs into the teacup.

He can fit his legs if he sits criss cross, and the warm water feels amazing against them. He sinks in as far as he can, closing his eyes and leaning back, propping his arms up on the edge of the cup. It’s sort of like the hot springs that he and Eva visited two summers ago, when Eskild gave them extra rations of pixie dust for a long holiday. They’ve always wanted to make another trip out there, and Isak supposes this is the next best thing.

The water stays warm for a decently long time, but when it starts cooling off, the teacup gets a little uncomfortable. The porcelain it’s made out of cools a lot faster than the actual liquid, it seems. He climbs out of it and then stands there awkwardly, before (thankfully, right on time) there’s a knock at the door.

“All good in there?” The human asks, and then the door creaks open. Isak hides behind the teacup while the human comes in, brandishing his clothing, now dry. “Here you are. They should be warm.” Isak pulls them on, and nearly sighs in relief at how warm they are. He’s all warm and dry now, save for his wings.

He looks up at the human, who still appears a little awestruck. “My wings are wet,” he announces, and the human looks even more startled than before. “I can’t fly so long as they’re wet. I can’t leave until they dry.”

“Is... Is there anyway to dry them?”

“Not without risk of breaking them. They’re pretty fragile.” Isak steps closer to the edge of the counter, holding his hand out. “Hi, I’m Isak.”

“Even,” the human says. “I think my hand is too big to shake yours.”

“Nonsense!”

“Isak, you’re like, two inches tall.”

Isak splutters, putting his hands on his hips and stomping his foot. “I am _not_ two inches tall! I’m, like, six inches tall!”

“You’re a strong three and a half inches,” Even says, and Isak scoffs. “Come on, let’s go back to my room. My sister has this dollhouse that you can stay in for the night, until the rain lets up.” He holds his hand out, and Isak climbs into it. He goes farther than that, climbing up Even’s arm until he can perch on his shoulder.

“I don’t like it that you’re taller than me,” Isak explains, and Even just laughs. Isak laughs, too, because Even’s laughter is contagious.

“Your laugh sounds like bells,” Even observes. Isak nods. “Reminds me of Christmas.”

Isak has a vague idea of what Christmas is, and it’s enough to make him blush at the compliment.

Even’s room is cozy. There’s a large dresser at the east end, with a dollhouse just Isak’s size sat on top of it, right in front of the mirror. The north wall has a bookshelf running horizontally along it, filled to the absolute brim with books. There’s a window above it, the one Isak came through. The one Isak tried valiantly to bust open. The west wall has Even’s bed, small but not to small, a white blanket spread over it. It’s not made up, and has clearly been slept in recently. Isak imagines it’s still warm. The south wall has the door and the closet, which Isak ignores altogether. He wants to get in the bed.

The room is an array of oranges, yellows, and whites; from the colors of the decorations to the color of the light filtering through Even’s yellow curtains. It makes the room look that much cozier, that much warmer. Isak much prefers being here than being in his own house, which is comprised of sticks and leaves and stones, and gets way too cold in the wintertime. He’s not one for chopping firewood and thus, he usually freezes until Jonas or Eskild supplies him with some for his stone fireplace.

Even sits down on the bed, and Isak jumps down, landing on a plush pillow. He bounces a little but doesn’t go far. “I like your bed,” Isak says, sliding off the pillow and crawling underneath the white blanket. “It’s much nicer than my own. My blanket is a leaf, which isn’t all that bad, but it’s not ideal in comparison to this. What’s it made out of?”

“Wool,” Even explains. “The white stuff on sheep.”

“You don’t... kill the sheep, do you?”

“No! Just shave them. And I don’t do it, I just bought this from someone else.”

Isak nods, poking his head out from underneath the wool blanket. “Thanks for letting me stay here. I would’ve been stuck on that windowsill for ages,” he says, and Even smiles. “But you can’t tell anyone I’m here. The number one rule is to like, not do this. Interact with humans. You shouldn’t know I exist. Eskild will kill me if he finds out I’m here, so.. Just promise, okay? You can’t tell anyone about me, not even your sister.”

Even holds up his right hand. “You have my word. No one would believe me, anyway.”

“Well, there’s no need to find out if they’d believe you or not.”

“No, yeah, of course.”

Isak steps out fully, sitting down on the pillow he’d originally landed on. “So. Were you sleeping? I know it’s evening, because the streetlight was on, but I didn’t think it was that late.”

Even shakes his head, laying back against his pillows. Isak watches him tuck his toes under the wool blanket, like they’re cold. Isak’s toes are kind of cold, so he does the same. “No, I was just sitting in bed, editing. I have a short film due for my directing class, so I was putting the finishing touches on it.” He pauses. “You know what films are, right?”

Isak nods. “I snuck into one once,” he says proudly, and Even chuckles. “I still remember it. It was called Finding Dory and it was about a bunch of fish and whales and shit,” he explains.

“I’ve seen Finding Dory. It’s pretty good. But quite frankly, my film is _much_ better.”

“What’s it about?” Isak asks, crawling closer to look at the screen. There’s people frozen in time, mid-sentence and mid-action. One girl is really pretty, reminds him of Noora, this super pretty fairy with some of the prettiest blonde hair that Isak’s ever seen. She’s talking to another girl, and they’re smiling.

Even points to the blonde. “Her name is Sara. She’s 18 years old and she’s just come out to all of her friends and family,” he explains. Isak knows what that means, he’d had to do that, when he was 15 and realized he liked boys. Even points to the other girl. “That’s Linnea. She’s 17 and she’s pretty sure she’s straight, but can’t explain her feelings for Sara. She pines after Sara for a while, because Sara seems like this untouchable cool girl, this iconic lesbian that Linnea thinks she’ll never be. Through her crush on Sara, Linnea comes to accept herself as pansexual. And when she comes out on Instagram, Sara is the first person to comment and congratulate her.”

Isak hums. He doesn’t know what Instagram is, but he doesn’t bring that up. “Do Sara and Linnea end up together?” He asks, and Even shakes his head. “What? Why not? They’d be cute together, look at them.” He gestures to the screen, and then plops himself down in the crook of Even’s elbow so he can see better.

“It’s not always about ending up with your crush, though, is it? It’s about the journey of self acceptance that Linnea goes through. Sara plays a role in that, but she’s just a supporting character.”

“They’d still be kickass girlfriends.”

Even shrugs. “Who knows, maybe they end up together sometime down the line. When they’re both in college and they share a women’s studies class and Linnea accidentally talks about her embarrassingly huge crush on Sara that made her realize she was pan, and Sara admitting that she had a crush on Linnea too.” He smiles at Isak, and it’s so bright that Isak’s stomach flutters. He’s suddenly glad that his wings can’t do the same. “I smell a sequel.”

“It’s an interesting story, I’ll give you that. But you know what would make it more interesting?”

“What’s that? More fairies?”

“No.” Isak rolls his eyes and jams his foot into Even’s skin, making the human boy hiss in pain. Isak climbs off of his arm and sits down on the wool blanket. He’s getting a little tired. “If I knew what the fuck Instagram was.”

Even laughs, and it doesn’t sound like Christmas bells, but Isak thinks that maybe it doesn’t have to. Even’s laugh is beautiful, and contagious, and Isak doesn’t know what he’s supposed to be afraid of. He’s not frightened of Even the way he knows he should be, the way the other fairies would expect him to be. He feels safe in this room, safer than he’s ever felt under something like a fucking mushroom.

It takes Even twenty minutes to explain social media and internet and Instagram, but Isak thinks he gets it by the time they’re done. Even doesn’t have an Instagram, but Isak thinks that if he were human, he’d quite like to have one. He thinks about the sorts of things he posts whilst Even prepares a bed for Isak, somewhere in the small dollhouse. Isak gets so lost in thought that he barely registers Even lifting him up and setting him on the small bed in the dollhouse. It’s actually pretty comfortable.

“The rain should be over by the morning,” Even says, and Isak feels the light pulling on his eyelids. “Your wings will be dry by then, yeah?”

“Yeah. Probably.”

Even hums. “Well, tomorrow morning you’ll get back to... Neverland, or wherever the hell youre from.”

“Neverland isn’t real,” Isak snorts. “We live in the woods. Every time you go into the woods, you run the risk of stumbling into a fairy village. Not that you’d ever know it, we use magic to disguise our houses.”

“Like Harry Potter?”

Isak smiles. “Yeah, perhaps a bit like Harry Potter.”

“Mm. Cool.” A pause. “Goodnight, fairy Isak.”

“Goodnight, human Even.”


	2. but i want it (it’s a crime)

“So, where do fairies come from?” Even’s voice floats over the shower curtain to where Isak’s sitting on the bathroom counter. Even had plans today, and so Isak was trying to talk to him as much as possible before he had to leave, because he knew he’d be stuck inside all day. The rain hadn’t let up in the night like it was supposed to, and they’d decided that keeping Isak inside until it stopped was the best option.

That’s mostly because the other options are:

1\. Try and fly in the rain (which will just result in Isak getting stranded again)  
2\. Have Even take him to the woods (and let Eskild find out that he’s been with a human)

Ultimately, staying with Even was the safest option on both counts. So, here he was, sitting on the faucet and swinging his legs in the air while Even showers. Isak had asked him where human babies come from (a question that had made Even choke on the toothpaste he’d been brushing his teeth with), and that in turn had made Even curious about where fairies come from.

“Where do you think they come from?” Isak asks.

Even pokes his head out from behind the shower curtain, showing Isak a sudsy pile of hair. “Look, I’m a shark,” he teases, and Isak just rolls his eyes, internally blaming his blush on the heat from the shower. Even disappears again, humming quizzically. “Well, I read this book called _The Little White Bird_ , and it like, introduces the story of Peter Pan. In that book, the author basically said that when a baby laughed for the first time, the laugh broke into a million pieces. And the fairies, like, developed from the pieces of the laugh. That’s sorta the same story as Tinkerbell, too, except in Tinkerbell, it’s whenever a newborn baby laughs for the first time, a fairy is born. Is there any truth to that?”

“Yeah, actually,” Isak says, looking at himself in the mirror. He’s never really seen himself before, except for in the reflection of windows and broken glass. This mirror is so much crisper, and Isak can even count all of his freckles and eyelashes. “The first one. A baby laughed and his laugh, like, exploded. And that’s where fairies come from. All the remaining pieces of that laugh.”

“So you don’t have parents?”

Isak chews his lip. “We do. I don’t talk to mine anymore. Well, not my dad. My mum... It’s a little complicated. We don’t see each other that often, but I don’t even know my dad, really. Not anymore.” He climbs off of the faucet and onto the vase holding the lilies. He climbs up one of the lilies and runs his fingers along the soft petals.

“I’m sorry about that,” Even says, and Isak just shrugs but doesn’t say anything else on the subject. Even, thankfully, changes the subject altogether. “So. Fairy sex isn’t a thing.”

“Oh, my god. Yeah, it’s a thing.”

Even laughs, and Isak smiles to himself. He catches a glimpse of his smile in the mirror, and quickly wipes it off. Eskild would be so pissed if he saw this. “Okay, so if it exists, it’s not for procreation?”

“It is.”

“I’m confused.”

“I’m not giving you fairy sex ed.”

Even groans. “Why not?” He whines, and Isak shrugs, before realizing that Even can’t see him do that. Even speaks again before he can say something, though. “Whatever. It’s kind of weird to think of tiny people having sex anyways.”

Isak laughs, this time. Even’s head pokes out from the shower curtain, just to flash Isak a smile before disappearing again. Isak can’t help but wonder why Even wanted Isak to see him smile, unless maybe...maybe Even just wanted to see Isak laugh.

He quickly gets rid of that thought. There’s no way Even sees Isak as anything other than a small, infantile type of mythical creature. Just a fascination, a story to tell his friends as soon as Isak is gone. Something to prove that all of his childhood fantasies about fairies and mermaids and Santa Claus were actually real all along.

(Well, Isak doesn’t know if Santa is real, but he quite likes to believe that he is.)

“Don’t think about it, then,” Isak snarks, and he can hear Even laugh again. Making Even laugh makes his chest fill with pride, little by little each time.

“Hey, Isak, come here.”

Isak balks. “Um, no? First of all, you’re naked.”

“We have the same parts, so you said.”

“And,” Isak cuts in, his cheeks flaming at the thought of seeing Even naked, “my wings will get wet. The rain could end this afternoon, and if I get my wings wet now, I won’t be able to leave!”

Even pokes his head out again. His hair is free of shampoo now, just sticking to his wet forehead. “Sounds like more of a reason to get your wings wet, then,” he teases. Isak blushes harder (he didn’t know that was possible), and flips him off. “But don’t worry, I have a solution for that. Just come here.”

Isak sighs but obliges, and decides to try out his wings. He leaps off the edge of the lilies and flits forward, cheering when he realizes he can fly. He flies towards the shower and lands in Even’s outstretched hand, which is damp but warm. He complains about his clothes getting wet again, while Even covers him with some clear piece of plastic. “What the fuck is this?” Isak asks, poking at the plastic over his head as Even pulls him in the shower.

“A shower cap,” Even says proudly. “We put it over our hair if we want to keep it dry while we shower. For now, it serves as a really large umbrella to keep fairy wings dry.”

“It’s always a good sign if a product is multipurpose.”

“Yes,” Even nods, smiling brightly. “My money was definitely well spent.”

Isak sits down with his legs folded, ignoring how wet his ass gets from the dampness of Even’s palm. “Why did you call me in here?” He asks, and Even just keeps smiling. Isak didn’t know it was possible for a human to be this happy all the time.

Even shrugs, “I don’t know. I just missed you. Is that weird?” Even’s actually blushing, Isak notices.

“I was just on the other side of the shower curtain. We’ve been together for like 15 hours.”

“But a lot of those were while we were sleeping!” Even protests. Isak rolls his eyes and stands up, still covered by the shower cap. “Where are you going?”

Isak flies up, and out in front of Even. He resolutely does not look down as he hovers in midair, wings flapping. He imagines he looks pretty funny with the shower cap held up by his head, dangling over his body as he flies. Even is laughing already. “Letting you finish washing up,” he says, but he’s pretty sure Even can’t hear him over his laughs.

“You look like a jellyfish!” Even giggles, and Isak understands. He knows what a jellyfish is, and he definitely sees what Even is seeing, even from his perspective. “All you need are some long ass tentacles and you could be one!”

Isak snorts, “Yeah, and if we completely disregard the fact that I’m a fairy in a shower cap and am much more intelligent than a jellyfish.” He flies around a little more, just to hear Even’s laugh again. It’s music to his ears, Even’s laughing.

“God, where have you been all my life?” Even sighs, holding his aching stomach. Isak bites his lip.

He wants to ask the same question, among many many others, but he doesn’t. “Probably putting money under your pillow after you lost a tooth,” Isak jokes, and Even laughs again, louder this time. Isak keeps fluttering around the shower, making Even laugh and keep trying to catch him. He never can. Isak’s too fast.

Suddenly, there’s a knock on the door. Even stops laughing and Isak freezes, his eyes going wide. Fuck. This is _not_ good. It’s bad enough that he’s letting himself get close to Even, he can’t get caught by somebody else too.

“Even?” A woman’s voice floats through the door. Isak panics, and tosses the shower cap off of himself. He flies up, humans almost never look up, and hides behind a shampoo bottle that’s on the ledge above the shower head. Even glances at him, and Isak trains his eyes ahead. He cannot look down. “Even, are you okay? Who are you talking to?”

Even sighs, looking away from Isak and poking his head out of the shower curtain. “Nobody, mum!” He lies. Isak sits down, readjusting the shampoo bottle to hide himself properly. He definitely doesn’t steal a glance at Even’s bum, that’s for sure.

“I can hear your talking and laughing all the way downstairs,” Even’s mum says. Isak hears the doorknob jiggle and he freezes, eyes widening in fear. Surely Even’s mum respects his privacy enough to not come barging into the bathroom, right? Even’s a grown ass man, she should have boundaries. Especially if she thinks there’s someone in here with him.

Even clears his throat, glancing back up at Isak. It’s only then that he realizes he’s still staring at Even’s ass, and his cheeks heat up when he’s caught. Thankfully, Even seems too panicked to notice that Isak was unabashedly ogling. _What do I do_ , he mouths to Isak, and Isak just shrugs. Isak’s always been told he’s a bad liar—which is total bullshit, by the way, he’s an amazing liar when need be—and besides that, he can’t think of any logical explanation. He doesn’t know what Even’s mum would think of Even being in here with another guy.

Or a girl, it occurs to Isak. Even is probably straight. Like, sure his film was about LGBT girls, but that’s not unlikely for a straight man to write. It’s pretty much common knowledge that lesbians are the number one way to a straight man’s dick. Isak even knows that, and he only learned about all of this stuff recently, when he came out to Eskild with the thought that maybe he liked boys more than he was supposed to.

There’s another knock, like it was possible Even had forgotten his mum was there. Isak definitely hadn’t forgotten. His heart was still pounding. “Is it Mikael again?” His mum asks, and Isak’s heart both soars and crumbles.

Confirmed: Even likes boys.

Confirmed: Even’s been in the shower with Mikael before.

Confirmed: It was recently enough that Even’s mum asked if it was Mikael again.

Isak shouldn’t be as disappointed as he is. It’s not like anything would ever happen between himself and Even. He probably doesn’t even actually like Even, he’s just enamored with the first human boy he’s ever come into contact with, and it’s not his fault that Even happens to be a Greek god. And aside from that, it’s highly unlikely that Even would ever look at Isak that way. Not when Isak is three— _six_ —inches tall and doesn’t even know who Baz Luhrmann is.

The fact of the matter is this: Even is a human and Isak is a fairy. They’d never be able to kiss or hold hands or have sex. Hell, once Isak goes home, there’s no way he’ll ever be allowed to come back. And if Eskild finds out, he’ll probably not even be allowed to leave the woods again.

He’s not into Even, anyways. Even is just hot and Isak is flustered. That’s all it is.

“—just friends!” Even is saying, when Isak tunes back in. Isak closes his eyes and tucks his knees to his chest. “You just jumped to conclusions.”

“Okay, well... Hurry up, then, you have class in less than twenty. And be sure to take an umbrella, it’s raining.”

Even sighs in relief, glancing up at Isak. Isak opens his eyes in time to see the blinding smile Even is flashing him. “That was a close one,” he whispers. “If it’s raining, you can’t leave. So, come on, then. You and I have a class to get to.”

 

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*

 

Rain is something Isak can deal with. Sure, it’s annoying and usually the source of him having to stay in the village so long that he gets cabin fever, but it’s _manageable_. And usually over within a few hours. What isn’t manageable is cold weather when it’s supposed to be warm outside. Even had, when they left, needed to walk back in the house and grab his coat. Isak had been upset about it, still sort of is, but circumstances made it a little more bearable.

Even’s coat has an inside pocket, is the thing. Large enough for Isak to sit at the bottom of, like he’s in a hammock, and close enough that Even’s headphones could reach it. Even had put one earbud in his ear and tucked the other one into the pocket for Isak to hold to his chest and listen to, feeling the soft vibrations coming from the white bud of plastic.

Isak isn’t entirely sure what song is playing, but it’s got a soft melody with lots of gentle guitar. It makes him sleepy, and warm on the inside.

_Her eyes and words are so icy_  
_Oh but she burns_  
_Like rum on a fire_  
_Hot and fast and angry_  
_As she can be_  
_I walk my days on a wire_

_It looks ugly, but it’s clean  
Oh mama don’t fuss over me_

_The way she tells me I’m hers and she is mine_  
_Open hand or closed fist would be fine_  
_Blood is red and sweet as cherry wine_

The music stops, and Isak does his best not to pout as the earbud is pulled out from the pocket. It’s replaced by a flood of light as Even pulls his pocket open, smiling down at Isak. Isak smiles back, but doesn’t dare move for fear of there being someone around, watching Even and possibly noticing weird movement in Even’s coat pocket.

“Here we are,” Even announces. “Philosophy 201. I have a feeling you’ll be quite into this class, so pay close attention.” The pocket closes again, and Isak listens to the soft drone of the professor’s voice, and tries not to question everything he thought he knew about life.

At one point, he wants to interject his own opinion. He wants to ask questions about the parallel universe theory, try to understand how there’s multiple versions of himself out there, maybe even one where he’s a human like Even, (where they can be boyfriends or something close to it, maybe, if Isak lets his mind go there). But he can’t. He can’t say anything, he can’t raise his hands and ask questions and find out more about the universe they live in. It’s too dangerous.

(But deep down, Isak doesn’t think it’s so dangerous after all.)


	3. old habits die hard

The next day, Isak chooses to stay back at Even’s whilst he goes to class. Even had set the dollhouse up in the closet (just in case Even’s mum came into the room, this way he was hidden) and had set up a couple of Christmas lights to give him something to read by. Isak hasn’t actually spent much time in the dollhouse, though. Instead, he was sat on the closet floor with the philosophy book Even had lent him, as well as a notepad and pencil. The pencil was nearly as big as he was, but he managed to write with it anyway.

Even’s philosophy book was so interesting. It was all about aesthetics and ethics and logic, and Isak was in love with it. His entire perspective of the world changed with each chapter he read, and he documented each of his thoughts and opinions and questions on the notepad. It was filled with sloppily written questions by now, but Isak didn’t care much.

Isak flips to a new page in the notepad, and titles the page CHAOS THEORY. He underlines it four times and then crawls back onto the book, using the light of the Christmas lights to read.

_[Chaos](http://fractalfoundation.org/resources/what-is-chaos-theory/) is the science of surprises, of the nonlinear and the unpredictable. It teaches us to expect the unexpected. While most traditional science deals with supposedly predictable phenomena like gravity, electricity, or chemical reactions, chaos theory deals with nonlinear things that are effectively impossible to predict or control, like turbulence, weather, the stock market, our brain states, and so on._

Isak stops reading to jot down ‘what is the stock market’, and then thinks for a moment before adding right below it, ‘what is turbulence’.

_These phenomena are often described by fractal mathematics, which captures the infinite complexity of nature. By understanding that our ecosystems, our social systems, and our economic systems are interconnected, we can hope to avoid actions which may well end up being detrimental to our long-term well-being._

Another note: ‘what are fractal mathematics’.

He wonders why Even hates Philosophy 201. Isak had gone to another class with Even yesterday, some class that was all about the English language, and Isak had been bored out of his mind. Even raved about that class afterwards, stellar reviews, as if he’d been sponsored by the professor to advertise the class. Isak had thought it was mediocre at best. And plus, the professor reminded him of Shrek (he’d taken a sneak peek, when Even wasn’t paying him any mind).

Philosophy 201, however, had made all of Isak’s synapses light up like fireworks. He’d never thought so deeply about his own life before, he’d never considered the things that the professor was talking about. And reading the book now only increased his curiosity, and he wanted to know more and more. The limitations of this book would never fulfill the capacity of Isak’s curiosity, and that was simultaneously disappointing and absolutely thrilling.

_The Butterfly Effect is one principle of chaos theory. This effect grants the power to cause a hurricane in China to a butterfly flapping its wings in New Mexico. It may take a very long time, but the connection is real. If the butterfly had not flapped its wings at just the right point in space/time, the hurricane would not have happened. A more rigorous way to express this is that small changes in initial conditions lead to drastic changes in the results. Our lives are an ongoing demonstration of this principle. Who knows what the long-term effects of teaching millions of students about chaos and fractals will be?_

That makes Isak sit back on his heels and read the paragraph again and again, fifteen times over. Aside from the elephant in the room, the glaringly obvious and immediate observation based upon the text—Isak’s own wings may have caused a hurricane, what the fuck—there’s the thought that everything Isak does could cause a metaphorical hurricane. He has no idea what the long-term effects of any of his actions will be, nor does he have any control over those long-term effects. He may not even be around (or alive!) to see the effects.

He moves back over to his notes and starts scribbling shit down, how the butterfly effect can be attributed to so many things, how small things affect big things just as much as big things affect small things. He writes until the pencil’s graphite goes dull, and goes through a whole ordeal just trying to use the pencil sharpener that Even had provided. It was yellow and plastic and shaped like a star, with a hole leading to a blade. Trying to turn the pencil in circles effectively is the greatest challenge, but Isak manages.

He writes until his hand hurts, until the graphite goes dull again, until his paper runs out of room. He reads more pages and writes more sentences, so caught up in the words he’s reading and how loud his thoughts are that he barely registers the passage of time. Before he knows it, the room is getting darker from the lack of sunlight, and he knows Even should be home soon.

Isak’s read through nearly the whole book, he realizes, and the exhaustion hits him like a freight train upon that realization. Just one more chapter, he rations, and then he’ll take a nap until Even gets home. When Even gets home, he’ll probably be woken up so Even can give him some food, and then he can go back to reading. He settles himself in front of the next page, chin held up by his hands, and begins to read.

The next thing he knows, he’s being woken up by a strange flashing light. He startles awake, barely remembers where he is, eyes darting around to figure out if the flashing is a potential threat. He makes eye contact with two _very large_ baby blue eyes and his half-asleep mind panics, so he flies upward until he hits the ceiling, plastering himself against the stucco. He can barely breathe, and he’s pressing his eyes closed so tightly that he’s seeing explosions of color behind his eyelids.

“Isak,” he hears, over the rushing sound of blood and the panic that’s making his limbs shake, his bones rattle. “Isak, relax, it’s only me. It’s just Even. I’m sorry, I never meant to scare you.”

Isak swallows hard, nodding a little so Even knows he’s acknowledged that. He doesn’t budge from his spot against the ceiling, too afraid to move. He’s worried his wings will give out, he’s so weak (and frozen) from panic. He does manage to open his eyes, however, and the first thing he sees is the pure guilt on Even’s face. Isak hates that he put that expression there.

“I’m sorry,” Even repeats. “You were just... You fell asleep whilst reading, I think. You were passed out on the page talking about feedback and fractals. You were curled up in a ball and you just..you looked really cute? So I took a couple of photos. Not to share,” he’s quick to add, “just for me. But I’ll delete them if you want me to, I know it sounds weird that I took pictures of you sleeping, I just— I’m sorry.”

“Stop apologizing,” Isak reassures, peeling himself off of the stucco. He’s sweaty and his limbs feel like jelly, but he doesn’t feel like passing out from paralyzing fear anymore. “I’m sorry, too. I’d forgotten where I was and when I looked up and saw a human, I panicked. Old habits die hard, I guess.” He flies down to the ground, closing the philosophy book and putting his notes aside. He doesn’t want to look at those until he finishes his reading.

When he’s done tidying, he flies upwards and takes his perch: sitting criss cross on Even’s shoulder. Even laughs a little and moves to sit on the bed, taking off his socks and his jeans to change into sweats (without jostling Isak too much, of course, because Even is surprisingly considerate). When he’s dressed in comfy clothes, he unpacks his bag to get all of the things he needs to do his homework.

That’s one more thing Isak’s learned: homework is the product of Satan. Even hates it, and Isak hates it, even though Isak has never had to do homework. Going to school isn’t really a huge concern for fairies. You learn what you need to learn from the older fairies. Basic survival skills, and facts about the environment. Anything else is learned from experience, or from older fairies who’ve learned things. Isak considers himself pretty well-versed in terms of modern knowledge, but some things go over his head. College level calculus is definitely one of those things.

“My mum won’t be home for another two hours, and my sister is at her friend’s for a sleepover. I think we can go downstairs and have dinner in the kitchen tonight, if you’re up for a little risk taking,” Even teases.

Isak puffs out his chest, putting his hands on his hips like he’s Superman. “Risk taker is my middle name,” he proudly announces, making his voice deep to sound like Batman.

So, Even read him a few comics before bed the previous night. Isak’s been a little obsessed, but it’s not a big deal.

“You have two middle names? Interesting.”

“Not any more interesting than you having two surnames.”

Even nods, “Fair enough.”

He pushes himself off the bed and walks out of his room, padding down the stairs to the kitchen. Isak holds onto a lock of his hair for balance, though he knows Even is being careful to ensure that Isak won’t fall.

“So, what do you want to eat?” Even asks, rifling through the cupboards. “My mum is obsessed with pasta, so we have plenty of that. Some potatoes, some chili mix, um.. More fucking pasta.” He moves over to the refrigerator, pulling it open and leaning forward to inspect. “We have eggs, and I know we have oatmeal and toast and cheese, so we could have breakfast for dinner. That won’t take too long to make, either. There’s also Ramen noodles, if you really want pasta. I’d make some really good food, like chicken parm, but I don’t have enough time for that.”

Isak shrugs, surveying the food and considering his options. Everything sounds good, if he’s honest. But he knows they’re limited on time, so he picks the easiest thing that isn’t pasta. “Breakfast for dinner,” he nods. “I like my eggs scrambled.”

“Good to know,” Even says, and Isak can hear the smile in his voice, “for future reference.”

“Future reference,” Isak reiterates, and Even hums in confirmation. Isak shrugs and flies off of Even shoulder, moving to sit on top of the refrigerator so he has a good vantage point to watch Even cook. “I think I should probably finish that philosophy book by the time we go to bed. Do you have any other books?”

Even laughs. “Yeah, you’ve seen my huge bookshelf. Why, is there a particular sort of book that you’re looking for? More philosophy, or a different subject? Maybe some fiction?”

“A different subject, maybe,” Isak nods, considering the options. He doesn’t want to read fiction. He wants to read about the world and learn about it more than he’d been able to before he got here. He wants to learn about the world beyond plant growth and which way the river runs the fastest.

“Hmm,” Even hums, considering. It takes a couple of moments before he speaks again, as he moves the spatula around the pan to cook the eggs. “How about astrophysics?”

“Astrophysics.”

Even nods, “Yeah. I have a copy of Neil deGrasse Tyson’s book _Astrophysics for People in a Hurry_. It might be a little hard for you to read and understand, though.”

Isak scoffs, folding his arms over his chest and tilting his chin up. “I resent that. I’m perfectly capable of reading and understanding whatever the hell Neil The Grass Tyson wrote.”

“deGrasse,” Even corrects, looking up at Isak for a moment before bursting into laughter at Isak’s mistake. Isak’s cheeks heat as Even laughs at him, he keeps his arms folded and his chin up, trying to keep his dignity.

“Stop laughing at me!” Isak whines, as Even does his best not to drop the eggs as he slides them onto the plate. As soon as the transfer is made, Even doubles over, nearly crying from laughing so hard. Isak pouts. “Stop! This isn’t funny, I don’t know who Neil deGrasse Tyson is!”

“I know, darling, I know.”

Isak doesn’t hear anything for approximately ten seconds after that, because Even just called him darling and he kind of can’t breathe.

He has to stop and remind himself that this isn’t what he wants it to be. He likes Even but it’s only as a friend, and Even probably doesn’t even return those feelings. Isak’s a fucking fairy for heaven’s sake, of course Even wouldn’t mind keeping him around. Isak shouldn’t be as invested as he is.

“Is it still raining?” Isak asks, as Even opens the bread box and starts pulling bread out. Even nods, but doesn’t say anything, and Isak groans. Of fucking course it’s still raining.

It’s not that Isak wants to leave, but he needs to get back to the village for at least a little bit. He needs to let Eskild know he’s okay, and Jonas and Eva and Magnus and Mahdi, maybe even Noora and Sana. He knows that they’ve got to be concerned, it’s been almost 3 days since they’ve seen him. For all they know, he could be dead in the water, literally and metaphorically.

Part of him misses Eskild, too. He knows he’s going to be in for the scolding of a lifetime when he does go home, but part of him wants it. He misses Eskild’s gentle reprimands, his kind protection. He knows that Eskild just wants him safe and happy, just wants what’s best for him, and he can’t help the sick feelings that curl in his stomach when he thinks of how scared Eskild must be.

He’s pulled out of his worrying reverie by the sound of pop music blaring through the kitchen, and he looks down to see Even standing by a radio. The older boy is smirking, turning up the volume even more.

Even grinned, “Gabrielle? Have you heard it?” He asks, and Isak shakes his head. “What?! Do fairies not have music?!”

“Of course we have music, you idiot,” Isak laughs, flying off of the refrigerator and hovering about two feet from Even. “Just not this sort of music. We make our own music. A lot of fairies are pretty talented singers, myself included. Not to be conceited or anything.”

Even turns the music up louder, and starts mouthing the lyrics. It’s Isak’s turn to laugh, flying in circles around Even’s head as Even sings and dances to Gabrielle. It’s a bubblegum pop song, Fem Fine Frøkner is the name (according to Even), and it makes Isak’s heart feel light and happy. He thinks about parallel universes and wonders if maybe, somewhere, human Isak and human Even are dancing in the kitchen to Fem Fine Frøkner, surrounded by eggs (with a tablespoon of sour cream, the secret ingredient), and maybe ( _hopefully_ ) sharing a couple of kisses in between verses. Isak wishes he could have that in this universe, though he knows that’s next to impossible.

But he’d quite like it anyway.

  
✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*

  
“Even motherfucking Bech Næsheim, if you don’t stop I will stab you in the eye with this goddamn pencil,” Isak warns, for seemingly the millionth time. Isak had been curled up for the past 45 minutes, reading the rest of the philosophy book and taking more notes. He keeps trying to go over towards the window to get some natural light before the sun sets, but Even keeps distracting him.

Even whines. “But it’s boring just sitting and watching you read. Talk to me instead,” he insists, and Isak rolls his eyes as he tries to tamp down the smile that’s threatening to break his façade. “And it’s getting dark already. You can’t read by moonlight, believe me, I’ve tried.”

“We can look at the stars, then,” Isak suggests. He wants to open the window, being cooped up all day is making him stir-crazy. “All of the constellations. I don’t know very much about them, just the Big Dipper and the North Star and all.”

“I have a couple of books on them,” Even admits, though he seems reluctant. His eyes flit nervously to the window and Isak can’t help but furrow his eyebrows in pure confusion. Even’s been acting oddly about the window all evening. And Isak can’t figure out why, or what could’ve caused it. Whatever it is, he won’t let Isak get near it.

“Okay...” Isak says slowly, raising his eyebrows a little bit. “Um, we can read it, then? I’m sure we can see some of the stars from the window, if it’s as dark as you said—”

“Not with rain clouds,” Even interrupts. Isak eyes him warily, nodding in agreement.

“Yeah. You’re right.” Isak stands, flying over to sit in front of Even on the bed. Even’s barely looking at him, more interested in picking at the blanket. “Are you okay? What’s going on?” Isak asks gently, resting his smaller hand on top of Even’s bigger one.

Even shrugs a little, meeting Isak’s eyes. Isak tries to read them—eyes are the window to the soul, and all that—but they’re indecipherable. Isak is left in the dark. “I’m just tired,” Even excuses, after a while of what seems to be careful contemplation. Isak doesn’t totally believe him, but decides not to push. It’s none of his business if there’s something wrong with Even. He’s not close enough to him to push the issue and insist that Even spill his guts. He wouldn’t like it if Even expected him to do that, so. He just nods and pulls his hand away.

“Go to sleep, then,” Isak says. “I’ll just sit in the closet and read, so the light doesn’t disturb you.”

Even shakes his head. “No, come up in the bed with me. We can watch Friends until we fall asleep. Have you ever seen Friends?”

“No.”

“Great,” Even says, already grabbing his laptop and pulling up Netflix. “Come on then, Isak. We can watch Friends. Well, you can watch Friends and I can pretend to be watching it even though I’ll really just be looking at you.”

Isak snorts. “Why would you be looking at me?”

Even shrugs, watching Isak’s movements as the fairy flies across the room to settle on Even’s shoulder. “You’re pretty nice to look at. Especially since your wings started glittering gold like that. Fairy dust?” He asks, and Isak nods in confirmation. “You’ll have to show me some magic when the rain stops. Like making a flower bloom or talking to animals.”

“Alright,” Isak agrees. “When the rain stops, I’ll do that. I promise.” It makes that smile, the big one that Isak loves so much, spread across Even’s face. Isak would promise anything and everything just to see Even smile like that.


	4. glass half empty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> i did not edit this at all and it probably sucks but oh well. also before you read this and start wondering why isak reacted the way he did to what eskild says — remember that he’s known even for 4 days and he’s known eskild his whole life. hopefully that makes sense :)

In the morning, Even seems torn between asking Isak to go to class with him, and wanting Isak to stay behind. He’s pacing at the edge of the bed, pulling the curtains shut tight over the window, like he’s expecting someone to be outside looking in. Isak’s a little worried, too, but only because Even is being so weird. It never crosses his mind that Even’s room is on the fifth floor, and there’s no way in hell that any human could peek in unnoticed.

“Are you ever going to tell me what the fuck is going on?” Isak asks, sitting back in a hacky sack that Even had found in the bottom of one his drawers two nights ago. It worked like a bean bag chair, fairy-sized.

“There’s nothing going on,” Even practically snaps. “How many times do I have to tell you that, Christ.”

Isak raises his hands in surrender. “Okay, okay, chill.” He eyes Even warily.

“Just...sit in the closet and read, okay? That’s going to keep my mum or my sister from seeing you. When I get home, we can go out to a field if it’s not raining. And you can show me the flowers blooming and stuff, right?”

“Yeah,” Isak nods. “The field near the fairy village is just behind that old café, the one that’s been here since, like, forever. There’s lots of flowers there. And I can make a stop home while we’re there.”

Even glances at him, and Isak can literally see him swallow. “Yeah, right,” Even nods. “Well, I should get going. Get in the closet, okay?”

Isak does. Even closes the door and fumbles around his room for a bit, and then he’s gone, and Isak is left with nothing but silence and his book. He grabs his notepad and his pencil, flipping open the pages to read. Maybe he’ll finish it by tonight, so Even can answer all of his questions. That would be nice.

Minutes later, sounds of incessant knocking on the window stops Isak from learning about astrophysics. It’s a little alarming, honestly, and Isak nearly stays in the closet just to stay safe. But the curiosity gets the better of him, and the knocking doesn’t stop.

Isak creeps out of the closet, quickly darting across the room. He goes behind the curtains and walks up the window, looking out to see who’s there.

He’s more surprised than he should be to find Eskild, expression a mix of anger and worry. Guilt wraps its clawed hand around Isak’s stomach, and he worries briefly about tossing the eggs that Even had made for breakfast. This is not going to be pretty.

He flies up and opens the window, stepping out of Even’s room and onto the ledge. Eskild immediately pulls him into a hug, holding Isak so tightly to his chest that Isak can’t breathe for a couple of moments. It’s okay, though, because Isak is more than happy to be in Eskild’s arms again. He’s missed these hugs, that’s for damn sure.

“I was so fucking worried about you,” Eskild murmurs, pulling back and cupping Isak’s cheeks, looking him over like he’s checking for injury. “You should’ve been home two damn days ago, you fucking idiot.” He slaps Isak’s arm, and Isak can’t even be angry. He’s missed that, too.

“I know, I know. And I’m sorry, I just—”

“And staying with a human?! Have you learned nothing?! You’re lucky you’re even alive!”

“I know,” Isak says again. “But Even... Even’s different. He took me in and let me take a bath, and he’s fed me and let me sleep here, and he’s teaching me so much, Eskild! Philosophy and science and how humans have babies, which is probably part of science, and he’s teaching me about films and tv shows and Netflix and he has this super nice wool blanket, did you know they don’t kill the sheep for that? Anyways, he’s really lovely, Eskild, I think I might even be in love with him.”

Eskild’s lips settle into a line, his face going grey. Isak’s excited rambling stops, the smile faltering from his face. “What?” Isak asks, and Eskild just looks away. “What, Eskild? Tell me what’s going on. Even’s been acting so weird lately and he won’t tell me anything, you can’t... You can’t keep me in the dark, too. Please tell me what’s wrong.”

“Isak, baby,” Eskild says gently, and Isak’s heart pounds in his chest. “Look up.”

Isak does, and he notices the bright blue sky, not a rain cloud in sight.

“It hasn’t rained in two days. Today’s the third day without rain, the fifth since you’ve been gone. I came here for the first time yesterday afternoon, and Even came the window. He wouldn’t let me in to see you, didn’t want you to leave. He just looked at me and shut the curtains.”

Isak’s heart soars, and he smiles. “Oh, my god. Are you serious?!” He asks, and Eskild nods a little. “That’s why he wouldn’t let me near the window! Even loves me, too! Oh my god.”

Eskild shakes his head. “No, baby, no. Issy, he.. Have you noticed anything weird? Any out of the ordinary behavior, other than not letting you near the window?”

“What? No! No, I...” Isak trails off, thinking back over the last few days. He thinks of all of Even’s questions, he thinks of Even’s pictures, he thinks of Even’s dollhouse with the lock on the side, and how he keeps trying to get Isak in it. He thinks of how Even didn’t let him near the window, didn’t want to let him leave the house, lying about the rain. He gulps, looking up at Eskild. “He..He took pictures of me. But he wouldn’t do anything like that, he wouldn’t spread them.”

“Isak, I’m not saying all humans are bad, okay? But in many fairies’ experiences, they have been. Humans manipulate, they blackmail, they gaslight. They make people, or fairies, believe one thing but then do another. Humans are selfish creatures, Issy, and I know it’s easy to believe he’s different but you have to think about this logically. Is he really all that different from the humans you’ve been warned about? Him taking pictures of you is a huge red flag, Issy. Why would he take pictures of you? Why wouldn’t he let you come home, if he wasn’t worried that you might not come back? Why wouldn’t he let you talk to me, if he knew how worried I’d be? Love can make a man selfish, yes, but greed...greed is the more likely culprit.”

Isak’s heart sinks to the bottom of his chest, and his heartbreak must read on his face, because Eskild is pulling him in for another hug. “He wouldn’t do that. He’s not like that, Eskild, I _know_ him,” he says, but he’s crying.

Eskild rubs his back slowly. “Sometimes things aren’t what they appear to be. Salt even looks like sugar.” He starts to pull back but Isak won’t let him, clinging tighter and crying harder. It shouldn’t hurt this bad, it shouldn’t sting like this, but Isak’s stomach is swirling with poison. “Come on, Issy. Let’s get you home, yeah?”

“I want to leave him a letter,” Isak sniffles, and Eskild starts to protest. “Eskild, please. Let me do this, okay? I know it’s stupid and it’s dumb and it’s dangerous but if he’s really out to spread those photos of me and tell people everything that I said, then leaving one letter can’t do anymore damage. You can’t set a burnt city on fire.”

Eskild sighs. “Okay. Make it quick, though. It looks like it might rain soon.”

Isak ducks back into Even’s room and grabs the pencil that’s only a little taller than him now, since he’d sharpened it so much. He tears out all of his notes and shoves them aside, scribbling down his goodbye letter. It’s stained with tears by the time he’s done, but Isak figures they’ll dry by the time Even returns. He swallows the lump in his throat and starts to leave. He doesn’t look Eskild in the eye as they fly up and away. He doesn’t want Eskild to see the tears.

The village is bustling when they return. Feeling at home again is enough to ease Isak’s mind just a little, but he still chooses to go home instead of going to see the boys. Eskild doesn’t protest, just says goodbye and lets Isak go.

Isak’s house is on the edge of a bumbling creek, just a little ways down from where children like to swim. There’s a cliff down there, tall enough to be exhilarating but short enough to be safe. A waterfall spills over the edge of it, runs the water downstream, all the way past Isak’s and down through the middle of the village. Isak’s far enough from the waterfall that it doesn’t disturb him, but he’s close enough that the white noise of water hitting rocks can lull him to sleep. He’s missed the sound, though now he wonders how he’ll be able to sleep without hearing Even’s snores. Maybe that’s pathetic. It’s only been five days, after all. He shouldn’t have let himself get attached when he knew things would turn out this way, in the end.

He pushes the front door open and is, for some reason, surprised by what he sees. Everything is exactly the same as he’d left it. And that wasn’t what he’d expected to see. He isn’t sure what he expected, but he has an inkling feeling that he’d gotten used to the chaos that Even brought along with him, he’d gotten used to all the things strewn across Even’s room. Books and movies and scrapped scripts.

Fuck, he needs to stop thinking about this and move the fuck on.

He walks through his house, exchanges his clothes for some that are in his wardrobe, and drops his dirty clothes in the garbage. After that, he walks straight through his house and out the back door, flying to the edge of the creek before plopping down on a rock, just off the shore. The water rushes around him, gets the tips of his toes wet. It’s cold, and the bottom isn’t porcelain, and he misses the teacup bath.

“Isak!” He hears, and immediately his heart squeezes in his chest. He’d completely forgotten that Vilde lived on the other side of the creek, and that she’d probably been waiting for his return for days. He stands up on the rock, brushes off his pants and smiles up at her when she flies into view. She squeals in excitement when she lays eyes on him, flying forward and enveloping him in a hug so tight that they both nearly go tumbling into the brook. “It’s so lovely to see you again! We were all worried sick, especially myself and Eskild! I was so worried that you’d been caught and killed by a human, or put in a museum or something!” She pulls back, a wide smile on her face still. “It’s so nice to see you back home now.”

“It’s nice to be home,” Isak says earnestly, because it is. Regardless of everything else, he’d been itching to come home. Vilde hugs him again, tighter than even before, and then finally settles down. They both sit down on the rock, legs pressed together and toes equally as wet from the water.

Vilde places a hand over his. “You’re thinking too loud,” she says softly, and Isak just chuckles a bit self-deprecatingly. He’d forgotten how well she could read people, how much she cared about what she saw in others behavior. “Are you okay, Isak? Did something happen while you were gone? Eskild didn’t tell us much, just that you needed help.”

Isak shrugs. “I stayed with a human. My wings got soaked and he let me in, to stay dry until the rain stopped. I just found out from Eskild that he’d been lying to me this whole time. That the rain stopped days ago. He was just trying to keep me there. And I thought he was trying to keep me there because we were friends or... or maybe because he had feelings for me. But i was wrong. I knew better than to think that, or I should’ve known better. He took pictures of me, and he kept asking me all these questions about fairies. Wouldn’t let me near the window to see Eskild. How could I have been dumb enough to miss all the signs, you know? I don’t get how I could’ve let myself fall for his bullshit when it’s something I’ve been taught my whole life.” He grabs a pebble from the shallow water and skips it across the surface, watching it sink after four skips.

“I don’t think you’re stupid,” Vilde murmurs, and Isak snorts. That makes one of them. “I don’t. You’re not stupid, Isak. I think you would’ve been able to tell if the human had bad intentions.” She taps her fingers against the top of his hand, makes him look up at her. She smiles gently at him. “Eskild isn’t always right, you know. Sometimes things are exactly what we think they are.”

“But—”

“I’m not saying Eskild’s wrong, but I’m not saying you’re wrong either. I just think that..you spent nearly five days with this human and he didn’t tell anyone, correct? And you trusted him. Nearly five days is a lot of time for him to do something. But he didn’t.”

“I’m in love with him,” Isak blurts out, and Vilde’s eyebrows go up. He blushes and turns away, facing a group of dandelions across the water. He raises his hand and makes them all bloom, and then barely exhales and makes them all explode, the seeds traveling downstream. “How pathetic is that?”

Vilde curls her fingers around his. “It isn’t pathetic at all. There’s no timeline on love, you know. And falling in love with someone isn’t always a choice. Believe me, I know.” That makes Isak turn to her again, eyebrows knit in confusion. Who was she in love with? “I’m in love with Eva,” she explains quietly, “and she’s with Jonas. Totally untouchable. I shouldn’t be in love with her, but I am. And that’s not my fault, I shouldn’t feel guilty for it. Love is love.”

“Yeah, of course. Hey, uh, it’s amazing that you like her, by the way. It must suck to see her with Jonas.”

“She’s happy,” Vilde smiles. “That’s all that really matters to me.”

Isak smiles back. “You’re a good person, Vilde.”

“Me loving Eva doesn’t mean I’m...you know. Like you.”

It takes everything in Isak not to wince. He has to remind himself that this is Vilde, who’s clearly questioning her secuality and has always been pretty ignorant. He reminds himself to be patient with her. “No,” he murmurs, squeezing her hand, “it doesn’t have to mean anything more than you loving Eva. You don’t have to put the label on it, if you don’t want to.”

“And you loving your human doesn’t have to mean anything more than that,” she insists, leaning her head on Isak’s shoulder. “Love is love, Isak. Love never fails us, even when it feels like we’re failing it.”

  
✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*

  
The rain starts just after noon. Isak sits in his house with Eva and Jonas, fingers curled around hot cups of tea. He looks at the size of the tiny teacups and tries to imagine taking a bath in one. The thought makes him laugh, which makes the two others smile. Apparently, like Vilde, they’d noticed how sad he’d been all afternoon.

“We missed you, you know,” Eva says, and Isak smiles up at her. “I was worried that a bird had gotten to you, or something.”

“She’s always so paranoid,” Jonas chuckles, and Eva hits him in the shoulder. They both start laughing, fondly looking at each other, and Isak’s heart hurts for Vilde. He looks down, away from a private moment, and tries to see his fortune in the tea leaves at the bottom of his cup. He sees nothing but a clump.

When he looks back up, they’re both staring at him. “Stop looking at me like I’m going to bust into a million pieces like a cracked doll,” he snaps, and Jonas looks away, but Eva doesn’t. She just keeps staring, like she’s trying to read him. Joke’s on her, though. She’ll never be as good at Vilde at reading people. She never has been. Eva’s gullible, she takes things at face value and believes the worst things before the truth. She can stare all she wants, but he knows she won’t find what she’s looking for, whatever that is.

“There’s something wrong with you,” she says definitively, and Isak fights the urge to roll his eyes. Anybody can tell that something’s up with him, she didn’t need to declare it like it was unknown. “I’m going to get to the bottom of it. You can’t hide it forever, you know. Internalizing pain never works.”

Isak shrugs. “I beg to differ. See, what I do is lock all of my pain in a box. And I lock it. And then I push it down, way deep down. And if it tries to come back up, I push it down even farther, and pile more pain on top of it to weigh it down, like an anchor.”

“That doesn’t work,” Eva snorts.

“Works for me,” Jonas says, and she hits his arm again. Isak just laughs and reaches over to high-five Jonas. Eva may be his girlfriend, but Isak knows Jonas’s loyalty towards him is unwavering. That’s why they’re best friends.

Eva huffs. “Whatever. You can keep pushing it down all you want, but no matter what you believe, it will come back up.”

“Why do you care so much?” Isak mumbles, putting his teacup aside. He watches Eva’s wings glow silver, thinks of how much Even would like that. “My life isn’t flowerbed gossip for you to go tell all your friends tomorrow morning while you’re painting the petals. It’s actually real, and my feelings actually affect my life.”

“I just want to help you!” Eva snaps, eyes wild. She’s clearly offended and honestly, Isak can’t blame her. He’s being a bit harsh, but he can’t really stop it. He looks down at his lap. “That’s all any of us want to do, is help you! Because we care about you, you fucking asshole. Just because you don’t want help doesn’t mean we’re going to stop wanting to help, and you might as well get used to it.”

Isak purses his lips and nods a little. “Yeah, I know. I’m sorry,” he whispers, and Eva doesn’t say anything. It’s quiet for a long time, and perhaps that’s why they hear it.

Someone in the distance, screaming Isak’s name. Way too loud to be anything other than a human. And Isak—Isak knows that voice. He knows that’s Even. His heart burns and shatters all at once, and he presses his eyes closed. This is it, he thinks. This is the butterfly effect. He flapped his wings and flew to Even’s and now there’s a hurricane. All of the fairies are at risk now, and it’s all Isak’s fault.

“I’m so sorry,” Isak repeats, and the tears spill over. 


	5. it matters how this ends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> highly recommended: reading this while listening to all i ask by adele

All of the fairies flock to the edge of the woods, leaves and branches rustling with their movements. Isak wonders if Even thinks it’s just the wind moving the branches like that, or if he’d seen the fairies (after all, he knows what he’s looking for). Jonas, Eva, and Isak join the crowds, flying under the canopy of the trees to avoid the rain, settling on a high tree branch at the edge of the woods. Even is soaked to the bone, shivering from the cold, and his eyes are darting around the tree line. He calls Isak’s name again, begs for him to please come talk to him.

Things start happening, then. The fairies are aware now that Even knows they exist, so they work on self defense instead of camouflage. Flowers raise up from the ground, a wall (though, admittedly, a permeable one). The rain falls harder, someone creates a strike of lightning, acorns come falling down like hail. It’s a meager defense, but Even looks shaken.

“Isak, please,” he begs. “Please just let me explain myself. And if you still want nothing to do with me, I’ll never come back here, I swear it.”

Eskild flies out, bigger than Isak but still way smaller than Even. Even, to his credit, at least has the decency to look intimidated. Or maybe he actually is. “What makes you think he wants to see you?” Eskild snaps, his voice echoing even over the rumble of the thunder. “You lied to him, manipulated him, made him think he actually _meant_ something to you, and you think you can show up here and talk to him? Seriously, are you high?”

“Please,” Even pleads. “I know I did some dumb shit and I made some mistakes but I haven’t done anything like what he thinks I did. I have the right to explain myself, if only he’ll listen to me.”

“You think we’ll let him?” Eskild asks.

“With all due respect, Isak is capable of making his own decisions. Whether or not he wants to talk to me is up to him, not you.”

Jonas stands up, anger all over his face. Isak tries to catch his arm and pull him back, but Jonas pulls his arm free and flies out. Isak starts to cry again, and Eva wraps her arm around his shoulders. The rain pounds even harder, but Even doesn’t look like he intends to leave anytime soon.

“Fuck you!” Jonas yells, flying out with Eskild. They’re both holding toadstools over their heads, the rain slip-sliding down the edges and narrowly avoiding their wings. What they’re doing is dangerous. But they’re doing it, and for Isak. It makes his heart warm a little, despite the chill of the rainstorm. “Who the hell do you think you are?” Jonas waves his hand and then lightning strikes again, bigger and louder than the one from before. Isak didn’t know he had that kind of power in him.

Even’s crying, Isak realizes. He can see the tears rolling, even despite the raindrops. He sobs, turning to Eva. “I have to talk to him,” he pleads, and Eva wraps his arms around him.

“Isak, please!” Even calls out, and Eva presses her arms tighter, whispering that it’ll be okay. Isak wonders how many people are watching Even right now, thinking about the crazy guy yelling at the woods. He wonders if they think he’s looking for a lost dog or a runaway child. He wonders if anyone’s looking at all. “You know me, Isak! You know I would never, ever do that to you! You know me, okay, please! Please come talk to me! I’m sorry!”

“Eva,” Isak begs, “help me. I have to talk to him, but not like this, I need... I don’t have any fairy dust, I don’t—”

Eva turns, looking at the throngs of fairies sitting in their hiding spots. Isak can just barely make out the sparkle of their wings. “Vilde! Magnus! Mahdi! Noora! Sana! Chris! Get over here and help me!” She turns back to Isak. “Come on, we’re gonna go to the bottom of the tree trunk, okay? Watch out for the raindrops.”

They fly down to the base of the tree, meeting up with their friends. No one asks questions, no one tells Isak he’s royally fucked up this time. They just wait for Eva to tell them what to do, and she does.

“We need to pool our dust together, okay? I’m not strong enough to do this alone, so I need help from all of you,” she says, and everyone nods. Magnus, as it turns out, is the one to ask what they’re doing. “Isak needs to be human,” she says definitively, and charged adrenaline runs through the air.

It’s a frenzy as they pool all the dust together, whispering and trying to figure out if this’ll work or not, and if they’ll be able to make him a fairy again once this is over. Even is still yelling, Isak is still crying, and rain is still pouring.

“Okay, okay, lets do it,” Mahdi says, turning to face Isak. There’s seven pairs of eyes staring at him, eye level. In the next couple of moments, slowly, the eyes get lower and lower, until he has to crane his neck all the way down to see them. They’re barely up to his shins, staring up at him with wide, amazed eyes. They did it.

“You’re tall!” Vilde gasps. She reaches over and grabs Eva’s hand, and Eva barely flinches. Isak just smiles, looking over at the tree line where Even is still standing.

He swallows hard. “Here goes nothing.” He swipes at his cheeks and makes his way out, trying to make sense of his gangly limbs. It takes him a moment to figure out his balance and center of gravity, nearly tripping a few times. But he makes it out in one piece, breaking the wall of tulips that the fairies had built, the tip of his shoe crushing a forget-me-not as he steps into the grass.

Even’s eyes dart to him, and widen impossibly as he stares. Isak strides over, closer to him, stops just before the tips of their shoes are touching each other. From this close, Isak can see the tears on his cheeks, mixing together with the raindrops. He fights the urge to wipe them.

“Isak,” Even chokes. “I’m so sorry. I never... I swear I never intended for any of this to happen. I know I lied about the rain and kept Eskild a secret from you and I’m so, so fucking sorry for that. But I never told anyone about you, I never planned on doing that, I swear. You have to believe me, Isak, I would never.”

“Then why did you lie to me? Why did you keep secrets?”

“Because, I—” Even stops, his chest heaving. He’s still shivering from the cold, and Isak knows Even will get fucking pneumonia if he stays out here for too long. “Because I have feelings for you, okay? And I was scared because I know it’s weird, and that it’d be practically impossible for us to ever be together, like. It’s like some weird ass Stockholm Syndrome, or something, and I just never thought you’d feel the same way, but I couldn’t bring myself to let you leave. I was so scared that, if you left, you’d never come back and I’d never see you again. And it was fucked up and I’m the biggest idiot alive, I know, and I’m so sorry.”

Isak steps closer. “You are, you know. You are a fucking idiot,” Isak says, and Even’s head dips down in shame. “But I was, too. I should’ve given you the opportunity to explain yourself. I got scared and I believed whatever Eskild told me and that wasn’t fair to you, and I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s okay. You’ve known Eskild forever and you’ve only known me for less than a week, I would never expect you to believe me over him,” Even murmurs. “Please don’t apologize.”

Even’s lips are turning blue, his hair sticking to his forehead like a weird mosaic, his whole body trembling under the weight of his sodden clothes. He looks pitiful, and Isak can’t help the frown that crosses his face. He touches Even’s arm, feels the chill of his skin. He knows that Even needs to get inside and get warmed up, and probably soon.

Oh, how the tables turn.

“We should get you home,” Isak says gently, and Even’s face shatters before Isak’s eyes. It hurts his heart, but he doesn’t say anything, just loops his arm with Even’s and starts them in the direction of Even’s house.

It’s quiet on the walk back, aside from Even’s teeth chattering and Isak’s muttering whenever he trips over something. Getting used to his longer limbs proves to be a task he can’t quite accomplish, especially considering the circumstances. There’s so much on his mind that he can’t focus on walking properly, and it’s a wonder that he hasn’t fallen and busted his ass yet. That would be the icing on top of today’s cake.

When they walk into Even’s house, Even calls out to see if anyone’s home. Nobody is. They leave their shoes at the door and Isak helps him upstairs, tries not to panic too much at how mottled Even’s skin is. He starts a warm shower, hand underneath the stream to make sure it heats. Even strips of his soaking clothing, though leaving on his boxers, which are so heavy from water weight that they dangle precariously off of his hips. Isak tries not to stare.

“I’m going to get in with you, okay?” Isak says, and Even’s head snaps up to look at him. “Like you said earlier this week, yeah? Same parts.” He takes off his own shirt and jeans—which he struggles with tremendously—dropping them on the tile floor. He fiddles with the edge of his boxers for only a moment before shoving them off of his hips and tossing them aside with the rest of his clothes.

Even sighs. “I-I do have t-t-to say, though, that sh-shrinkage may be af-ff-ffecting me,” Even stutters out, trembling with the cold as he laughs at his own joke. Isak rolls his eyes and puts his hand under the water again, telling Even that it’s warm and he needs to either get undressed fully or get in the shower with his boxers on. Even mulls it over for a few moments before taking them off, and then steps into the shower. Isak follows suit, pulling the curtain closed.

With both of them full sized, the shower is a lot more cramped. Isak doesn’t mind it, though. He just ensures that Even has warm water on him, warming him up. He grabs the bottle of shampoo that he’d hidden behind not even four days ago, and squeezes a dollop into his hand. He works it into Even’s hair, smells the mint aroma, and tries not to meet Even’s eyes.

“I’m capable of washing myself,” Even murmurs, and Isak just shrugs a little. “Thank you,” he adds, his voice small. Isak doesn’t respond to that, either. He just rinses Even’s hair and then reaches for the body wash, putting some on Even’s loofa and starting to wash Even in small circles over his chest. Even doesn’t protest or crack a joke this time.

As Isak makes his way down, lathering Even’s body and slowly feeling as the older boy’s trembling stops, tears well in his eyes. He isn’t sure how things got to this point, the point of being so mind-numbingly sad and difficult, how things got to the point of Even standing in the rain for god knows how long just to plead for Isak’s forgiveness. Or, rather, plead for Isak’s consideration. He’d never asked for forgiveness, had even explicitly stated that he’d be okay without it, so long as Isak just listened.

A hand cups his cheek, and Isak can’t help but lean into it as he keeps up his washing. “Isak,” Even says quietly, and Isak bites the inside of his cheek. “Isak, are you crying?”

“How can you even tell?” Isak laughs, but it’s full of water.

“Same way you could tell I was crying in the rain,” Even murmurs, his thumb brushing over Isak’s cheekbone. Isak closes his eyes for a moment before pulling away from Even’s tough, and standing up to rinse the loofa off. “Isak—”

“Rinse.”

Even frowns. “Isak, come on.”

“Just rinse, okay?” Isak pleads, tears falling even faster now than they were before. Even obliges, stepping back under the water to rinse all of the soap suds off. When he’s done, he steps out of the direct stream and stares at Isak as if to ask _what_ _next_ , and Isak isn’t 100% sure he knows the answer. “Did you mean it?” Isak asks, finally. “When you said you had feelings for me, did you mean it? Or did you just say it to appease Eskild? Please be honest with me, I can’t handle more lies.”

Slowly, like it hurts, Even nods. Isak wants to snap and tell him not to look excited, but he knows why Even is so hesitant. Isak can’t imagine the bravery it must take to tell someone you have feelings for them, especially when the aforementioned someone is normally six inches tall and sporting golden fairy wings.

He supposes it’s possible, though. He’s living proof of the opposite: falling in love with someone who’s more than 10 times your height and has limbs 10 times bigger than your own. They’re stuck in the same hell with different demons, fighting the same battle with different weapons. Isak knows it hurts like hell for him and he figures it must hurt like hell for Even, too. Forever isn’t plausible for them, isn’t even a thought. How could a human and a fairy have a happily ever after, a forever fairy tale? They can’t.

But what they can have is right now.

“I’m so happy to hear you say that,” Isak all but sobs, closing the space between them and pressing their lips together. Even seems surprised at first, but quickly gets into it, his hands finding their place on Isak’s hips and pulling their bodies closer together. Water from the shower gets in their mouths a little bit, and the kiss is sloppy (Isak’s never kissed anybody before, not that he’d ever admit it). There’s no life revelations or fireworks and Isak’s heart doesn’t skip a beat—if it did, he’d be concerned for his health. It’s just a kiss, nothing more than that, but also one million things more than that. It isn’t about the kiss itself, it’s about what the kiss means, and how it makes Isak feel inside. There aren’t fireworks but he definitely feels butterflies, and not the kind that cause hurricanes.

“I can’t believe you’re actually real,” Even murmurs when they pull away, and Isak raises his eyebrows. “Like, I can’t believe you’re a real human. Or, like, human sized. I can’t believe you’re actually standing here looking like that.”

“Do I look bad?”

“No!” Even is quick to say. “No, you... Shit, you were pretty when you were a fairy but god, I swear you look like a sculpture. I can’t believe you’re real.”

Isak grabs Even’s hand, places it over his heart so Even can feel it beating. “I’m real, and this is real. I won’t be able to be this size forever, probably not even for a full day. And I won’t be able to turn human all the time, this is just...a one time thing.” His eyes are swimming, and he can feel his lip wobbling. “Which is why we have to make the most of now, okay? Because there’s no way of telling if...” _If we’ll ever get to be together like this again._

“Don’t cry,” Even murmurs, and Isak shakes his head, wiping at his eyes. He’s not even sure why he’s crying anymore. “I wish there was some way you could stay like this. We could go on proper dates and we could get you into a university where you could get all the books you like and learn about everything you want to know. I could cast you in my films for class and we could hold hands on public transit and kiss and cuddle and have dates where we pretend to study but we really just make out the whole time.”

Isak stares down at his feet, his grip on Even’s hand loosening where it’s still on his heart. Even notices it immediately, and shifts so he can hold Isak’s hand, their fingers laced together. “I wish it could be like that, too,” Isak sighs.

“Or I could be a fairy,” Even adds, pulling Isak so their chests are flush together, their fingers still locked. It’s as if they’re ballroom dancing, but there’s no room in the shower for something like that. “I wonder what my wings would look like. I wonder what the fairy village looks like. Imagine you and I going on dates to, like, fuck with humans. I think, if I could fly, I would travel everywhere that I could.”

“If I could fly,” Isak says, as Even smiles, “I would go anywhere that you went.”

“You can fly,” Even murmurs.

Isak shrugs. “Guess that’s why I’m here, then.”

Even surges forward to kiss him again, like he can’t quite believe Isak would say something as romantic as that. Isak just smiles into it, kind of can’t help it, even despite the heavy weight of the air around them. The world has a lot of weight to it, and sometimes Isak feels like it rests on his shoulders. It doesn’t feel like that when he’s in Even’s arms, though. When he’s there, it feels like someone’s picked up the load and is helping him carry it. As cliché as that sounds.

“It’s getting late,” Even murmurs, and Isak nods a little. “We should get to bed, maybe.”

After they’ve dried off, Even gives Isak a shirt to wear. It’s still a little big on him, even if he has grown a substantial amount in the last couple of hours, and he can tell from the way Even’s eyes darken that he approves of how Isak looks. It makes Isak blush as he climbs into Even’s bed, underneath the wool blanket and tucked into Even’s embrace. Even’s hands are low on his hips, near his ass, and it makes Isak laugh.

“See something you like?” He asks, and it’s Even’s turn to blush. “You’re not very subtle.”

“I’m sorry,” Even says, and moves his hands up. Isak pushes them back down, even lower this time.

“Who said I didn’t like it?”

Even bites his lip, and Isak watches as the older boy’s blue eyes become nearly all black pupil. “How long are you here?” Even asks, his voice gruff as he shifts to try and pull Isak into his lap. Isak laughs, moving to straddle Even’s thighs.

“All night.”

“Good,” Even nods, and kisses Isak again, but with more heat and tongue than they’d been using earlier. Isak finds he has quite the love for hickeys, finds himself turning his neck more and more just so Even will sink his teeth into the soft skin of Isak’s throat. He knew those vampire teeth would be good for something one day and damn, are they good.

He wonders if those purple marks will still be there in the morning, when he’s small again. The thought makes his eyes fill with tears, so he looks away before Even notices them and starts thinking that Isak isn’t enjoying this. He’s cried too much today. And he is enjoying it, a lot, and he loves Even so much but...but that doesn’t seem to be enough for the universe. He shifts his gaze away from Even, and tries to look for the clock. Instead, he lays eyes on the goodbye note he’d written, only one part visible above the crease. He can read it from his place on Even’s lap.

  
_I just want you to promise me one thing, Even. Promise me that, no matter who you fall in love with, no matter who you spend your life with, promise me that you’ll always have a place in your heart for me. Even if it’s not the biggest part of the most significant part, even if it’s the part you hate about yourself, the part that you wish you could get rid of, like a bad cold or an unwanted tendency for jealousy; promise me you’ll always love me, too._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there is fan art for this fic, done by my amazing friend marta (@drawnbymarta on ig) for whoever wants to go check that out! so far marta has drawn isak’s teacup bath, isak on even’s windowsill, isak sharpening the pencil, and isak and vilde having their heart to heart. marta has other absolutely amazing drawings, of course, so if you don’t follow her already then do it now!!


	6. ive been thinkin’ bout forever

Isak leaving in the morning isn’t going to be like the movies. There won’t be any texts asking why Isak wasn’t there when Even woke up, no calls for coffee dates later. Isak isn’t sure there will be anything after.

He’d shrunk at some point in the night, he isn’t sure when. His wings were back and his hands were tiny and he couldn’t kiss Even anymore. Maybe that was the reason he was leaving without saying goodbye. Or maybe it’s because he said goodbye the last time, and well, he saw how that worked out. He needs to get out of this house and go back to the village and make things right again, set things back on track, get his life back to normal. Nothing’s gone right since he’s met Even, no matter how much it feels like the opposite. It’s just a delusion.

He decides to take the goodbye letter. He folds it up real small and shoves it in his pocket. It sticks out a little but not much, not enough to create a problem when he’s flying back. He doesn’t want Even reading that thing again, over and over until he drives himself crazy. He wants Even to move on and be with someone who actually has the world to offer him, someone who has a _body_ to offer him. Isak can’t provide that.

In the end, leaving is harder than he thought it would be. He sits on top of the mirror just above the dresser and watches Even sleep. The boy’s arm is stretched out over the expanse of empty sheets, where Isak can just make out the imprint of his own larger body and where it used to lie. He misses his limbs and his broad shoulders and the chest that Even had coated with kisses. He wonders if Even will miss it, too, or if he’ll just miss Isak.

The early morning is quiet. There’s sunlight filtering through the open curtains, and Even’s wool blanket is pulled up to his navel, and the thermostat is set to the coziest temperature, warm without being hot. It’ll be hard to walk out that door, Isak is positive, but he knows the hardest part will be walking out without looking back. That’s why he needs to do it now, before a simple glance back will mean looking at Even cry. It would be impossible for him to turn his back on that.

Part of him knows he’ll regret it, deep down. But he knows he’ll regret it more if he invests time only for things to crumble to pieces like they’re predestined to do. He doesn’t want to hurt Even like that. He doesn’t want to hurt himself like that. Investing their time in a relationship that’s doomed to a certain fate isn’t in their best interests and Isak would rather hurt Even now than subject him to that much more immense hurt however long down the line. It hurts like hell now, but he knows he’s doing what’s right, and that eases the ache just the slightest bit, enough to give him the courage to fly off of the mirror and head for the window.

“Isak?” He hears, and it crushes his heart. He quickly darts to hide behind the curtain, praying to the god he doesn’t believe in that Even didn’t see him. “Isak?” The bed squeaks under the weight of Even getting up, and Isak listens to Even’s footsteps padding out of the room. He takes it as the opportunity to unlock the window and fly out, not looking back to see Even’s reaction when he finds the open window.

When he gets back to the woods, the wall of flowers is gone. The crushed forget-me-nots are still there, and Isak wonders if there’s something poetic in that. He flies through the trees and down to the village, stopping at his house. When he pulls the door open, he finds Eva and Vilde already there, asleep in his bed. Isak has half a mind to wake them up, but they’re cuddled together, and Vilde is smiling in her sleep, and Isak finds that he doesn’t have the heart. So he leaves.

Jonas’s house is a bit down the brook and to the right, burrowed in the bushes, carved into the trunk of a tree. Isak finds the door already propped open, so he lets himself in. Jonas is at his table, eating breakfast. “Oh, hey, Isak,” he says, like he was expecting Isak to come through his door at 7am. “You’re back early. I figured you’d be with your boytoy all day. Speaking of, how did that go?” He turns to Isak with a smile, and Isak takes a deep breath.

“We...We had sex,” he says, and Jonas’s eyebrows raise. “I know you’re wondering why in the hell I’m here, considering we had sex. But it didn’t feel like...like a step towards us being together. It felt like a goodbye.”

Jonas licks his lips. “Do you think Even felt that way about it, too?” He queries, and Isak can’t manage more than a halfhearted shrug. He has no idea how Even interpreted what happened last night, and honestly, he’s pretty sure he doesn’t want to know. Even’s a romantic, and that gets in the way of his ability to see the reality of situations sometimes. Isak would probably crumble and melt if Even went on some tear-filled monologue about how much that night meant to him, and about how he felt closer to Isak in that moment than he had ever felt to anyone else. “Don’t you think his opinion matters, too?” Jonas asks next.

“I don’t know. I shouldn’t just stay with him because he wants to be with me. I don’t have to do anything that I don’t want to, I don’t need his permission to do that,” Isak snaps.

“Of course not,” Jonas agrees. “I just think that you’re lying to yourself. I think that you want to be with him more than anything, and you’re scared of that, so you’re running.”

“Scared of what? Of being with him? I’m not scared of that.”

Jonas turns his body so he’s facing Isak full on, and it makes Isak squirm. Jonas has a way of making you feel cornered, and he can pull the truth out of nearly anyone with just a few choice words. Isak knows he’s not immune to that. “No. You’re scared of what that might mean for you. You’re scared to try it because it might be a little difficult, a little unconventional. You’re scared because it’s going against everything you’ve ever been taught to be true, and I understand that, I really do, but sometimes you just have to say _fuck the rules_ and put your own happiness first.”

Isak opens his mouth to say something, but snaps his mouth shut right after. He doesn’t really have an argument for that. And even if he did, Jonas would tear that one to shreds, too. Jonas is right. But that doesn’t make Isak any less apprehensive.

“I know it’s hard,” Jonas continues, “but I just want you to think, for a moment, of how it’ll feel when the whole day goes by and Even doesn’t come running after you. Because he won’t. He said it yesterday, that if you don’t forgive him, he won’t fuck with you again. He’s not coming to look for you, he’s not gonna come running and begging again. And it’s gonna destroy you when he doesn’t, isn’t it? You’re waiting on him to come running so then you have an excuse to go back to him, because you’re too scared to make the choice to put your happiness first. But you’re going to have to get over that, Isak. You’re gonna have to be the one running to him, this time.”

“I’m..I’m not sure I’m ready for that,” Isak admits. “I don’t think I’m strong enough.”

“That’s your choice, then.” Jonas turns back to his breakfast, spearing a piece of sausage and then glancing back up to Isak. “But for your information, you’re one of the strongest people I know,” he murmurs, and then goes back to carefully chewing.

They’re quiet for a few moments, Jonas just eating and Isak sitting there. Jonas gave him a lot to think about. He’s right, in the back of Isak’s mind he’s waiting for Even to come running and begging. He also knows that Even won’t do that, not this time. And he wants to go back, more than anything. He wanted to go back the moment he left, but...but he’s not sure he’s welcome back, now that he’s left. He’s not sure Even will ever let him back, or if he’s too hurt.

Okay, that’s bullshit. Isak knows that Even would welcome him back with open arms, no questions asked. But Isak wasn’t lying when he said he wasn’t sure if he was strong enough to swallow his pride and his fears and show up on that window again, to tell Even he loves him and that he’s sorry and that he’ll make any sacrifices he needs to so they can be together. He isn’t sure he’s strong enough to make the sacrifices that need to be made. He isn’t sure they’re worth it, no matter how much his heart screams at him that Even is worth anything and everything.

“Maybe you should talk to Eskild,” Jonas says, and Isak realizes he’s gone quite a few moments without speaking. “I know he’s against the whole thing, and I think that’s where a lot of your apprehension is coming from.”

Isak considers it, tilting his head from side to side as he weighs the pros and cons. “Yeah, I guess so.” He stands up, walking over to Jonas’s pantry. “For now, though, I’m starving. Make me some of whatever it is that you’re eating.”

“Demanding,” Jonas laughs, putting his dishes in the sink and then moving to make Isak some breakfast. “You’re lucky I love you.”

“Why can’t you just be my boyfriend?” Isak sighs, shifting to sit on the counter and watch Jonas cook.

Jonas shrugs. “I dunno, man. I’ve got Eva and you’ve got Even. If we’re still single when we’re forty—”

“You’ve got yourself a deal.”

After breakfast (and a bit of a debate over whether or not sex with a human is better than sex with a fairy, since neither of them have done both), Isak heads out to find Eskild. He knows not to try Eskild’s cottage because Eskild is hardly ever there, and he knows that Eskild is definitely not at work. He’s probably down by the cove, looking at all the boys swimming and chatting with all the girls that are there for the same reason.

The cove is on the far end of the brook, the farthest point in the village from Isak’s own cottage. It’s tucked between two large, gnarled trunks of cut down trees. There isn’t sand but there’s a bunch of water-eroded pebbles that lead down to the water, and minnows that play in the shallows. The younger fairies go to the cliff by Isak’s but the older ones frequent the cove, where they can smoke and wade and makeout and no one will care. Isak doesn’t go there very much, but Eva and Jonas do.

Sure enough, Eskild is sitting on a pile of woven grass fashioned into a chair, talking to a group of girls. Isak doesn’t hesitate to fly over and approach them, tapping Eskild’s shoulder insistently. Eskild grins when he sees Isak. “Baby Jesus, long time no see! How’s it going?” He asks, simultaneously shooing the girls away. Once they leave, Isak gets down to business. There’s no use beating around the bush.

“Eskild, I need to talk to you about something. Or, rather, about someone.”

“What happened with Even?” Eskild asks instantly, and Isak knows better than to ask how he knew. He figures he’s an open book, especially to his guru.

Isak sighs, plopping down on the pebbles and picking one up. He rolls it around his palm, trying to form words. “I just... We talked a little, you know? He said he didn’t want me to leave because he was scared that I wouldn’t come back. He knows he fucked up and I know he fucked up, but love makes people do crazy things sometimes, right?”

“Crazy like false imprisonment?”

“First of all, it wasn’t like that. Second of all, I distinctly remember you stalking David for a solid month after he sucked your dick behind the cove.”

“Fair enough,” Eskild concedes. “But that’s different. He’s a human, Isak, and—”

Isak explodes. “So what?! Who the fuck cares if he’s a human? Are they actually so different from us? Because I don’t think so! We have the same body parts, we speak the same language, we all have thoughts and feelings and families and—and we love the same way they do. We have sex the same way they do.”

Eskild’s eyebrows raise so high that they nearly disappear above his hairline. “You fucked him?” Eskild asks, and Isak nods hesitantly, waiting for the scolding he knows is coming. “Holy shit, baby, that’s fucking amazing! Tell me everything! How was it? Is he big? Top or bottom?”

“Eskild!” Isak hisses, cheeks flaming as he looks around to see if anyone was listening. Thankfully, it didn’t appear that anyone was paying them any mind. “Fuck, I’m telling you any of that, it’s none of your business.”

“At least tell me if it was good.”

Isak rolls his eyes. “Of course it was good. It was amazing, but it wouldn’t have mattered if it was bad. It wasn’t about the sex, it was about us showing how we felt about each other.” He twiddles his fingers around the pebble, sighing heavily. “Which is why I’m so confused now. I want to be with him, but I don’t know how it would work out.”

“It’ll be hard,” Eskild nods. “And it’s still dangerous, I maintain that. But you should do what makes you happy. You shouldn’t care so much about what _might_ happen, or what other people think about it. Okay?”

“But—”

“I think you should be asking yourself why you need my approval so badly. And I don’t mean that in a bad way, Issy K, I just mean that you shouldn’t put my opinions and reservations above your own. It doesn’t matter what I do or don’t approve of. You’re 18, you can make your own choices. And I trust that you’ll make the best ones for yourself, whether I disagree with them or not.”

Isak’s heart warms, and he scoots closer to Eskild. Eskild’s taken kind of a father figure role in Isak’s life, filling the hole that his own father left behind. Maybe that’s why Isak so desperately seeks his approval, maybe that’s why Eskild’s opinion holds so much weight. And Eskild basically just gave Even is blessing, in his own cautious and protective guru way, and Isak’s never been more overwhelmed with affection for Eskild before. He’d never felt like Eskild was one of his true best friends before now, like maybe they were equals in experience. He realizes now that Eskild isn’t all-knowing, that Eskild can be wrong too, sometimes. It’s comforting.

“I think I’m gonna sleep on it,” Isak says cautiously. “And then, if I still want to go back, I will.” He glances down at where the note is still sticking out of his pocket, and hands it over to Eskild. “This is what I wrote him, the day you came to get me. I think this is why he came after me in the first place, because he realized how I felt and knew that he needed to tell me he felt the same way, but... I don’t want it anymore. I don’t want to read it everyday and I definitely don’t want him reading it again, so. Will you get rid of it for me?”

Eskild nods, holding the note in his hands. “Can I read it?” He asks gently, and Isak nods. Eskild unfolds it slowly, and Isak is greeted with his own sloppy handwriting. Again.

  
_Even—_

_I’m returning to the village, with Eskild. I wanted to leave you this note so you know that I don’t blame you. I know that you lied about the rain, and that you took pictures of me, and that you wouldn’t let me see Eskild. I know about the lock on the dollhouse and I know how nervous you were to let me leave the house. And I wanted you to know that I don’t blame you for wanting to tell people about me, or about fairies. It’s not everyday a random fairy turns up on your windowsill, right? It’s not everyday that your childhood fantasies prove to be real._

_For example: my biggest childhood fantasy was always meeting a human. And I did! I met you, and you surpassed every single fantasy I could’ve ever had. And that’s a pretty good feat, you should be proud of yourself. You helped me realize that the world isn’t as ugly and corrupt as I was raised to believe. You opened my eyes to so many things, from philosophy to astrophysics to how to make ramen noodles properly (and the secret ingredient in scrambled eggs). I don’t think I have the words to thank you for that._

_And I definitely don’t have enough words to thank you for fulfilling my other fantasy: finding someone to fall in love with. I know that there’s no way that anything could’ve happened, but that’s okay. The emotion of love and the feeling of love is so much greater than anything I ever expected it to be, and I don’t want anything more. I would never ask for more._

_Leaving is one of the hardest things, but I have to do it. It’s killing me, believe me it is, and I’m sorry if it hurts you, too. But things were meant to be this way. We can question the ways of the world but we can never change them, no matter how hard we try. That’s where humans get confused, I think. We can’t change the way things are, no matter how hard we try, no matter how hard we love or how badly we want it._

_I just want you to promise me one thing, Even. Promise me that, no matter who you fall in love with, no matter who you spend your life with, promise me that you’ll always have a small place in your heart for me. Even if it’s not the biggest part of the most significant part, even if it’s the part you hate about yourself, the part that you wish you could get rid of, like a bad cold or an unwanted tendency for jealousy: promise me you’ll always love me, too._

_Isak_

  
Eskild folds the note back up, and that’s when Isak sees the tears in the older fairy’s eyes. It makes Isak want to cry, too. “You’re wrong, you know,” Eskild says, his voice wobbly. “In a gentle way, you can shake the world.”

“Gandhi said that,” Isak laughs, but it’s filled with tears.

“I can’t do _everything_ , Issy!” Eskild complains, but he’s laughing, too. “You know, maybe individuals can’t change the world. But they can definitely get things started. They can plant the seeds in others’ heads. It takes a village to raise a child, but it only needs a mother to give birth to it.”

“I love you, guru,” Isak whispers, leaning up to throw his arms around Eskild’s neck. Eskild hugs him back, and they’re both blubbering messes and laughing at themselves for it.

“I love you more, Issy K.”

  
✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*

  
That night, Isak goes to his mother’s cottage, and knocks on the door. She looks the same as he remembers the last time he saw her; glittering gold wings and kind green eyes, and a huge smile when she realizes it’s her son standing at the door. The hug comes first, and a thousand cheek kisses, before they finally head inside for tea.

“I was wondering if I could stay the night, mum,” Isak asks, and he definitely doesn’t miss the way his mother’s face lights up. “There’s a lot I’d like to tell you about. For example, I’ve met a boy.”

  
✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*

  
The rain starts at 4am, while Isak is nestled in the bed he grew up in, fast asleep and snoring. It doesn’t stop for three days straight. And when it does, Isak steps outside his mother’s cottage, and he goes to see Even.


	7. let your heart be light

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> pls ignore my mistakes i did not edit
> 
> HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO ALL MY FELLOW AMERICANS!
> 
> (sorry if the christmas is too americany, but i am american and know nothing about norway)

Even’s window is just as intimidating this time than it was the first time, in Isak’s mind. It’s a different sort of scary, because this time, he’s afraid of being shut out, whereas the first time, he was afraid to be brought in. He’d give everything for Even to welcome him in the way he had two weeks ago, but every sinking feeling in his body knows that the opposite is just as, if not more, likely to happen. Isak takes a deep breath, shaking his limbs as if to get rid of the nerves, and then he knocks.

There isn’t an answer, so he knocks again. And again. And again. By the fifth time, he feels like he’s in the middle of some sick twist on a knock-knock joke, and he can’t even be angry about it. A lot of this situation is his fault, if not most of it. Even’s been nothing but confident in Isak and Isak hasn’t even extended the same courtesy thus far. He has half a mind to accept the loss and just go home with his tail between his legs, but he knows better than that. He knows he has to swallow his pride and work for this, show Even that he’s prepared to make the sacrifices that are inevitable.

“Even, please,” he says gently, though he’s not even sure that Even can hear him. “Please talk to me. I know I shouldn’t have left, both times I shouldn’t have left. I have no excuse for that and I won’t try to make any, but...just please talk to me, yeah?” He knocks for the sixth time.

Silence. Isak sighs and goes to knock for the seventh time—he’ll knock five hundred times if that’s what it takes—but just then, the curtain is pulled back and the window is opened. Even looks just as beautiful as he always does, he still takes Isak’s breath away—but he has these slight purple bags under his eyes, like smears of eyeshadow, and Isak’s stomach somersaults at the knowledge that those are at least partly his fault. He doesn’t know how things got this messy, but then again, he shouldn’t have expected anything less.

Surprisingly, Even just smiles when he sees Isak, stepping back so Isak has room to fly in. And he does, if not hesitantly, settling down on the wool blanket. Even follows suit, climbing onto his bed and looking at Isak expectantly. “I’m sorry I left again,” Isak murmurs, because that’s what he came here to say and beating around the bush with stupid excuses and explanations would be a disservice. He’s here to apologize and that’s what he’s going to do. “I shouldn’t have. I was freaked out but that’s… I should know better by now, to just talk to you so we can work this out together. Not everything is about me, I need to learn that.”

“Why are you apologizing?” Even asks, and Isak frowns. He can’t quite tell if Even genuinely thinks Isak has nothing to apologize for, or if he’s just that angry, that apologizing is futile. Isak tenses for the blow, though he knows Even won’t swing. “You needed space. I mean, sure, I would’ve loved a goodbye or something, but I knew you’d come back. You’re allowed to need space to think.”

Isak wants to protest, to say that he knew he was _allowed_ to need space, but that he went about it all wrong. But Even saying that he knew Isak would come back keeps running its rounds in Isak’s head, and he can’t help but stare back a little blankly. His shellshocked expression makes Even laugh, and it’s such a wonderful sound, one Isak wasn’t expecting to hear quite yet, if ever again. Everything is so surreal, Isak kind of wants to pinch himself to make sure this reunion isn’t happening in his wildest dreams.

Isak’s pretty sure he’s heard the saying _people only say goodbye if they want to see you again_. It was in a book or something, one he’d barely glanced over when he got tired of reading the philosophy book. So he can’t really wrap his mind around the fact that he snuck out, literally ran from the sound of Even’s voice, and yet Even was still so sure that he was going to come back.

“How could you possibly have been so sure about that?” Isak asks. Because Even isn’t wrong, that much is obvious. Maybe that’s what’s so rattling about it.

Even shrugs. “Because you came back the first time, didn’t you? Anyway, it doesn’t really matter much, does it? You did come back, that’s the important part, not the fact that I knew you would.” He leans over the edge of the bed, holding up frayed and dusty books, a stack of three. “I got these spell books from my friend Olga. And—”

“Christ, Even,” Isak says, because he knows where Even is going with this, he doesn’t need the elaboration. Maybe there’s some irony in that. “I don’t like where that sentence was headed.”

“Isak, I want to be with you.”

“You’ve known me for like two weeks! And that’s a huge decision, one that will change your whole life. You won’t get to see your family again.”

“You became human once! I could do that, too. Not often, but sometimes, and—”

“Even, you have to think this through logically. You’re literally going to use magic, _black magic_ , to become a fairy just so you can date a boy you barely know. And what happens if we break up? Then you’ve sacrificed your entire life and future, and for what? A failed relationship? To get your heart broken? I can’t let you do that.”

Even shrugs, pushing the spell books aside. “It isn’t up to you. I’ve actually thought about this a lot, okay? Once I moved out, I was planning to go to Bergen. I would’ve hardly seen my family anyway, only on holidays and random visits. This would be the same thing. Plus, with this, I don’t have to worry about all the things I’ve _been_ worrying about: housing payments, university, finding a career, having children before I’m too old for it, somehow finding a way to pay for food and gas and a way to move to Bergen. All of that stress is gone.”

“And replaced with different kinds of stress!” Isak rebukes. “Even, this is ridiculous.”

He flits over to one of the spell books, opening the front cover and reading it. If Isak wasn’t literally made of magic, he would’ve thought it was all bullshit. It looked fresh out of Harry Potter, complete with potions and specific pronunciations of spells. Isak knew, deep down, that it would work. But he also knew what Even would be giving up.

“You’d be giving up your dreams,” Isak continues. “All the plans you had of being a director? Writing scripts and directing films, and showing them at film festivals, and eventually being a box office success one day? All of that would be down the drain. Being with me isn’t worth giving that up.” Being with him isn’t worth giving _anything_ up, but he knows better than to actually say that to Even.

At this point, Even actually looks discouraged. It hurts Isak to talk Even out of doing something that would enable them to be together, it really does. But Even’s happiness means more to Isak than his own. And he knows that Even doing this means running the risk of Even never getting to see his dream become a reality. It means missing out on Christmases and Constitution Days and Easters, if the pixie dust doesn’t work correctly. No more Sunday dinners, no more seeing his mum and sister everyday, no more university (even if Even claims to hate it, Isak doesn’t believe that).

The older boy takes the books back, putting them on his nightstand. Isak sees a pill bottle there, and Even sighs. “It’s Lithium,” Even explains, grabbing the pill bottle and placing it in front of Isak. “It’s a psych med. It’s, like, the fourth medicine I’ve tried. It’s not great, and it kinda makes my hands shake, but it’s better than the others I’ve tried. Seroquel made me feel like I was narcoleptic, and Cogentin… I wish I had an opinion of Cogentin, but I could never remember what happened after I took it. Trileptal was okay, but it gave me really bad acne.”

“Isn’t lithium an element?”

“Yep,” Even nods, taking the pills and putting them back on the nightstand. “Some people call them lithium salts. I’m due to try Klonopin next, if this one doesn’t work out. I just got this bottle from my psychiatrist like, a month and a half ago.” Isak bites his lip, wants to ask why, but he isn’t sure if that’s rude or not. He came here prepared to apologize, not to ask Even about his brain chemistry. “I know you wanna ask why. I’m bipolar. And if you don’t know what bipolar disorder is, there’s a bunch of long ass paragraphs online that I could show you, but since we’re kinda busy, I’ll give you the short version. It’s basically a disorder that causes periods of depression and periods of mania. There’s a lot more to it than that, but I don’t really feel like getting into it.”

Isak nods, “Okay. Thank you for telling me. For, like, trusting me with that information, I guess.”

“And, before you ask, my bipolar has nothing to do with my decision to look at these spells.”

At that, Isak’s eyes widen. “Fuck, no, I know that. I swear I didn’t think that’s what it was,” he rushes, and Even just smiles. Isak’s shoulders sag in relief. The last thing he wants Even to think is that Isak would ever judge someone for a mental disorder. He thinks briefly about his mum, but decides not to bring her up, for fear of sounding like those idiots who respond to a coming out with _hey, I have a gay cousin._ “What did make you want to get these spell books?”

“Isak, don’t play dumb.”

He tucks his chin to his chest, sighing heavily. “Okay, fine. But I still say that you need to seriously think about this. This isn’t a decision you can make in only a couple of days, especially not when your emotions are all over the place like they have been. You need to think this through with a clear mind, and with _logic_. Think with your brain, not your heart. And especially not your dick.”

Even laughs, reaching over to tap Isak gently, as he would punch him in the shoulder if he was human-sized. “Shut the hell up, you were just as desperate for that as I was,” Even giggles, and Isak just rolls his eyes. “See, you’re not denying it! Fuck, it was a good night, though. I was thoroughly impressed, despite your lack of experience.”

“Oh, fuck off,” Isak groans, and he can feel his cheeks turning pink and hot, but he’s still laughing. He knows Even would never really make fun of him for something like that.

Besides, Even was (once again) one hundred percent correct. That night was amazing, and it surpassed every single one of Isak’s hopes and dreams of what it’d be like. He definitely wasn’t going to deny that.

“I promise I’ll keep thinking about it,” Even concedes finally, and Isak nods. He wants Even to scrap the idea altogether—he really, really isn’t worth such a bold move—but figures he’ll have to settle for the inch he was given. Perhaps Even would come to his senses and make the right decision. “How long can you stay?”

Isak smiles a little, uncertainty painted all over his face. “As long as you’ll have me?” He murmurs, and the smile that crosses Even’s face is so gorgeous that Isak wants to paint it, if only he had the talent for that. He could never do Even’s beauty any justice.

“God, I can’t wait until I get to kiss you again.”

“You’re quite horny,” Isak jokes, to take the sharp edge of the tension off of the statement. It works, because Even laughs and wiggles his eyebrows, twirling his hips in a way that is probably supposed to be enticing (and kind of is, because Isak is just that into him). “There’s other ways to go about this, you know.”

“What, like mutual masturbation? Damn, you’re a kinky one.”

Isak’s cheeks go bright red. “No, you idiot!” He whines, and Even just laughs again. “Fuck, I meant about _us_ , like our relationship. We can’t kiss or—or do that, but we can still be together. We can go on picnics to secluded places. You can sneak me into a movie theater. If you’re home alone, we can cook and eat dinner together. There’s things we can do despite the size difference.”

“You’re right. We’ll make it work.”

And something about the way Even says it, the way he says we _will_ make it work, not we _can_ make it work—it makes Isak’s heart butterfly against his chest.

  
✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*

  
One month in, and it’s Isak’s 19th birthday. Even knits him a tiny sweater just his size, and embroiders a heart on it. Isak wears it all day, even when it gets too warm (it is late June, after all), just to see the smile on Even’s face. If he’s honest, that smile is the only reason that Isak does anything.

  
✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*

  
Four months in, there’s frost showing up on the corners of Even’s window panes. It’s late October and Halloween isn’t too far away, and they’d eaten so many pumpkin-flavored sweets that Isak’s stomach ached, and Even told Isak that he loved him for not-the-first time. Isak says it back.

  
✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*

  
Five months in and Even is completing his third semester at UiO. The time to transfer to Bergen is quickly approaching, and Isak knows that Even leaving means the end of their relationship. Isak couldn’t fly to Bergen and he couldn’t leave the village to just follow Even there. Bergen means the end, but Isak learns to be okay with it. Even’s happiness means more to Isak than anything else. This is Even’s dream, the thing he’d been chasing since he first believed fairies were real, no proof needed. Isak refuses to allow himself to get in the way of that, so he reassures Even that whatever he chooses, Isak will support it one hundred percent, even if the thought kills him inside.

  
✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*

  
Six months in and it’s Christmas Eve. Even had invited Isak over for Christmas dinner with his family. They all knew Even had a boyfriend but had never met him—Isak had only turned human a handful of times over the course of the six months, and none of those times had been anything family related, he’s damn sure about that—and apparently they were all itching to finally put a face to the name. Isak was just as nervous, if not even more.

He and Eskild turned human, and they went shopping for proper Christmas clothing. So many shops were closed but they managed to find a small boutique tucked behind a warehouse. Isak gets slacks and a button up and the shiniest pair of shoes he’s ever seen in his life. He buys a bouquet of lilies for Even’s mum, because those are the flowers that had been in Even’s bathroom all those months ago, so he figures Even’s mother must like them.

Eskild leaves him at Even’s doorstep, where Isak swallows his nerves and knocks. Even answers the door, smile so wide his eyes are crinkling at the edges, and it makes Isak want to press him against the wall and make out right then and there. But he has an inkling feeling that such an display would be frowned upon at a Christmas dinner, so he settles for gently kissing Even’s cheek and asking how he was.

“Absolutely amazing. Better, even, now that you’re here,” Even smiles, and kisses Isak on the lips. Isak wouldn’t mind a hundred more kisses, but he can hear someone impatiently beckoning for them to come and introduce Isak, so they leave the foyer with small, amused smiles gracing both of their faces.

Sitting around the table is Even’s mum, his sister, his grandmother, his grandfather, his great grandmother, and two of his cousins. Isak swallows hard and takes a few deep breaths before walking into the dining room, and smiling at all of them, walking around to kiss all of them on the cheeks. The lilies were originally for Even’s mum, but in the moment he chooses to give them to Even’s great grandmother. The decision works in his favor when her cheeks go bright pink and she gives him the tightest hug he thinks he’s ever received.

“I think everyone already knows, because I talk about him _all the time_ ,” Even laughs, and everyone hums in agreement, “but this is my boyfriend, Isak.”

“Hi, nice to meet all of you,” Isak waves, sitting down in between Even and Even’s mum at the table. Even squeezes his knee under the table, and Isak reaches down to put his hand over the top of Even’s. Their fingers lace together, though Isak isn’t sure who moved to do it; who shot first, Han or Greedo?

Dinner goes easily. Conversation flows, and Isak remembers all the lies he’d made up to answer with when the family asked about his life ( _20, not from Oslo, doesn’t go to school anymore, works for his mother_ ). Things get a little awkward when they ask why Isak isn’t with his own family for Christmas, but it’s around then that Even’s cousin Mathias spills his wine all over Even’s mum’s nice tablecloth, which sends her into a frenzy. It’s shitty for the tablecloth, but Isak can’t help other than to breathe a sigh of relief to have the attention off of him.

When everyone’s stuffed full and nearly ready to clear the table, Even starts clinking his fork against the edge of his wine glass. The room falls silent as Even stands, looking particularly nervous.

“I have something I want to tell everyone,” Even announces, and Isak’s brow furrows. What could he possibly be telling them? His eyes keep darting nervously between his family and Isak, and it’s almost like he’s trying to announce their engagement, only _they’re not engaged_. He can tell that Even’s grandmother is following the same train of thought, because there’s a sweet smile on her face, and she’s staring Isak down from across the length of the dining table. “As you all know, I’ve been looking for ways to further my career as a film director. Since I just finished my fourth semester at UiO, I’ve been interested in studying and Bergen. I got my acceptance letter two months ago, as most of you know— and, in short, I’ve decided to start my fifth semester of university in Bergen.”

Isak’s stomach turns a little sour. He almost wishes that was an engagement.

Mostly, though, he’s happy for Even. Of course he is. This is an amazing opportunity and Even has made the choice to follow his dreams, Isak would never be upset or mad about that. So, he stands up and pulls Even into a kiss, momentarily forgetting about Even’s family watching him.

“Congratulations,” Isak whispers, “I love you.”

“Don’t worry that pretty little head of yours,” Even whispers, as if he can read Isak’s mind. He doesn’t say anything else, just kisses Isak again and then moves around to accept congratulatory hugs and kisses from his family.

After helping clear the table and do the dishes, Isak and Even retire to Even’s bedroom. Even has a few gifts around the room, already opened. Isak looks at some cameras and some films, until his eyes land on what appears to be a tiny person stuck in a glass ball. He picks it up, shaking it around, watching the fake snow fly.

“Even!” He gasps, and Even hums. “What the fuck? Are they alive?” Isak asks, squinting at the tiny person. “That could be _me_ in there!”

“No, baby, that’s just a statue,” Even laughs, gently taking the snow globe and turning a lever on the bottom. The tiny person inside spins among the floating fake snow, the small tinkling melody of _Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas_ playing.

Isak laughs, too. “Oh. Duh.” He takes it from Even and puts it back down, and then locks his arms around Even’s neck. Even’s hands rest on his waist. “I’m proud of you, you know.”

Even smiles, nudging their noses together. “I’m happy that you are. But I lied. I’m not going to Bergen.” He digs in his pocket, sticking a ripped out piece of paper in Isak’s confused face. “I’ve thought a lot about it, and I’ve decided that this is what I want. Please don’t try and talk me out of it again.”

Part of Isak knows that he should try and talk Even out of it anyway. But, instead, he launches himself forward to crash his lips to Even’s, lacking finesse at first due to urgency, but nothing short of magical and perfect. Isak doesn’t know what came over him, but he’ll blame it on the four glasses of wine he’d had at dinner.

“I love you,” Even breathes, rubbing small circles into Isak’s hips with his thumbs.

“God,” Isak laughs, “I love you, too.”

 


	8. right back home to you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> italics are flashbacks
> 
> unedited

“Are you sure about this?” Even asks, hand trailing over Isak’s arm, up and down in slow motions. It tickles, makes the hair raise on Isak’s skin, but feels good, almost good enough to lull Isak back into sleep. He knows Even won’t let him fall asleep, though. They’re due to leave in less than an hour and they’d already procrastinated for too long. “Wake up, baby,” Even murmurs, essentially proving Isak’s point. “Come on.”

Isak sighs into his pillow, rolling over in Even’s hold so he can tuck his face into Even’s chest. He’s not that much smaller than Even, so it’s a little awkward, but he doesn’t mind. Even doesn’t mind either, that’s one thing Isak’s learned over the last three months of Even being a fairy: he loves to cuddle. And Isak’s never really had anyone to cuddle with before, besides Eva and Vilde. He hadn’t realized just how touch-starved he actually was. Not until he had Even, who was so tactile and touchy and almost clingy that Isak could hardly keep up. He certainly enjoyed trying to, though.

“How hard can it be?” Isak mumbles into Even’s bare chest. His skin is warm and soft, and Isak wouldn’t mind sucking a few bruises there, if he had time. “I’m just introducing you to the woman that means the most to me, that’s all.”

Even chuckles, pressing kisses to Isak’s hair. “It’ll be okay,” he murmurs. Isak is 100% sure that Even is more nervous than Isak is, so he really appreciates Even’s ability to be so calm about it while Isak panics. “I don’t think I’ll ever get used to this.”

“Used to what?”

“This,” Even murmurs, squeezing Isak tighter and holding him closer. Isak blushes--he can’t believe he still blushes, even after 9 months of being with Even--and allows Even to pull him into a cocoon. It’s warm, and Isak likes being held like this, like he’s the only person in the world that matters. The only _anything_ in the world that matters. “We really should get up now.”

With only a little bit of difficulty, Isak follows Even out of bed and to the shower. Even’s been fascinated with fairy showers ever since he’d arrived, and it’s still true now, because when they step into the bathroom, the first thing Even does is laugh.

He likens it to a bidet, even though a bidet looks more like a toilet. The thing is that the faucet is about waist level so water doesn’t cascade over the whole body, in order to keep their wings dry. It makes sense when you think about it logically, but Even finds it absolutely hilarious, and continuously makes jokes about how it’s only logical to clean the ‘most important’ parts first. Isak guesses it would be funny if he was 13 years old, but he’s not, so it’s not funny.

Besides, even if he did think it was funny (honestly, he doesn’t think it is), he’d never admit it to Even. He knows his boyfriend, and his boyfriend would never let him live that one down.

Even puts up a good front, Isak will grant him that. He remains calm while they shower, brush their teeth, dry off, even while they get dressed. It’s not until Even starts gathering the baby’s breath flowers he’d picked that Even’s shell cracks, and Isak notices the way his fingers tremble around the stems. It hurts Isak’s heart in a weird way, in a way that makes him want to wrap Even up in cozy blankets and give him a million neck kisses (Even’s favorite to receive) until he never does anything but smile.

As it is, he opts for crossing the room and helping Even tie a neat ribbon around the bouquet. Even doesn’t say anything about his nerves, so Isak doesn’t either, but he doesn’t miss the small smile that Even offers him.

“If this is some joke about the origin of fairies..,” Isak teases, making Even laugh. “I know we’re going to see my mother, but I really don’t think she’ll catch on.”

“Ha ha,” Even ‘laughs’ dryly, snatching his bouquet back and smoothing out the ribbon. “There was just a lot of baby’s breath over by the cove, and Eskild _happened_ to be there and he _happened_ to tell me that baby’s breath are your mother’s favorite wildflowers.”

Isak narrows his eyes. “You say that like you specifically went to the cove, knowing Eskild would be there, and asked him what my mother’s favorite flowers are, thereby breaking our unspoken agreement to not tell anybody about this.”

“An unspoken agreement is not an agreement,” Even protests, but he leans forward to kiss Isak’s cheek (Even’s favorite place to give kisses). “I’m sorry.”

“I don’t really mind, I was just giving you shit.”

“Well, still.”

Isak hums, looping his arms around Even’s neck to kiss him properly. Even leans into it, even opens his mouth to let Isak kiss him deeper, and that’s how Isak knows that everything will be okay. No matter how things go, Even’s not going anywhere.

They leave about ten minutes later, with kiss-bruised lips and mussed up hair. Even is concerned that Isak’s mother will say something, but deep down, Isak knows that she won’t. He’s nervous about them meeting, yes, but he knows that his mum just wants to see him happy. And being with Even is the happiest ever been, and he knows his mum will be able to see that. He’s more worried that she won’t like Even, that the things that made Isak fall in love with him will be something that irks her, but if he’s honest with himself, he doesn’t think it’s likely.

It’s kind of impossible to dislike Even. Since being a fairy, he’s charmed nearly everyone in the village. Eskild had practically cried when he realized what kind of person Even truly was, and they’d spent the night consoling him for his guilt over the assumptions he’d made back when Isak was stuck in the rain. Jonas had practically fallen in love with him, as well, which made Eva quite jealous, except for the fact that she loved him too. Vilde had taken the most to him, the first time they met. Even and Isak were huddled together on the same rock that Isak and Vilde had sat on, back when they had their heart-to-heart, when Even first met Vilde. It’s a nice memory.

_“Are there any fish in this pond?” Even asks, stepping out onto the rocks on the shore, peering down into the water._

_Isak joins him on the rock, lacing their fingers together. “I don’t know, maybe some minnows. Definitely not any now, since it’s freezing.” He pauses. “I hope you don’t expect to see, like, koi or something when summer comes,” he teases. Even laughs, standing up straight and tossing an arm around Isak’s shoulders. “I’m pretty sure the water wouldn’t even cover ¼ of their bodies.”_

_“Yeah, I’m sure,” Even grins, leaning forward to press their lips together. It’s been less than a week since Even did the spell, and they can’t get enough of each other. They can’t get enough of having lips to kiss and hands to hold and someone to cuddle with at night. Isak’s sure it’ll wear off in time, the newness of it all, but it definitely isn’t in the foreseeable future._

_They sit down on the rock, Isak half in Even’s lap, their toes dipping into the cold water. There’s snow on the ground around them, since it’s January, and the water is freezing, but neither of them really seem to mind. They’re not thinking about it. They’re so focused on each other that they don’t notice the biting cold, and they also don’t notice the company they’d acquired until the aforementioned company clears her throat._

_Isak looks up to see Vilde hovering in front of them, a tentative smile on her face. “Hi, sorry, I don’t mean to interrupt. I just heard that Even was here now, in the village, and I was coming over with some blueberry cakes.” Isak glances down at the covered plate in her hands and his mouth instantly waters. Vilde made amazing cakes. “I didn’t realize you two would be outside, or, um, busy. Otherwise I would’ve come over later… Is there a time that—”_

_“Now’s fine,” Isak interrupts, offering her a warm smile. “It’s fucking freezing out here, though, do you want to come in?”_

_“Oh, no, sorry, I’ve got to get going actually. Noora and I are going to lunch,” she says excitedly, flying closer. “I don’t think it’s a proper date, not yet, but I really like her. She’s taught me so much about what it means to be a lesbian, and I’m pretty sure that’s what I am. A lesbian, I mean. I was pretty scared of that word for a while, but I think if I keep using it, I’ll learn how to draw empowerment from it. That’s what Noora said.” Before Isak has time to congratulate her, she glances at Even and gapes, her eyes wide. “Oh! I’m sorry, I haven’t introduced myself. Hi, I’m Vilde.” She flies closer, shifting her cake to one arm, and holds out her hand for Even to shake._

_Even grins, reaching to shake her hand and then reaching to relieve her of the cake plate. “I’m Even, pleasure to meet you,” he grins, and she blushes._

_“The pleasure’s all mine,” she returns. “Isak’s told everyone so much about you. The last time that we spoke, he was so worried that it wasn’t going to work out. I had to tell him to trust himself, because, see, he has this habit of self-sabotage. I don’t know where it came from. It was nice, though, to have that talk with him. He has some pretty wise words in that head of his, too.” She smiles at Isak so kindly that he can’t even be annoyed by her oversharing. Instead, he just nods and smiles back, and he delights in the way she glows under the affection._

_“Isak’s told me plenty about you, trust me,” Even laughs, placing a hand on Isak’s lower back and rubbing circles there._

_“Has he? All good, I hope.”_

_“As if there’s anything bad to say,” Isak teases, and Vilde laughs._

_“I really hate to run so early, but I have to shower and get ready. It was so nice to meet you, and it was lovely to see you again, Isak.” She bites her lip. “Maybe we could go for breakfast tomorrow or something? Or whenever you’re free, I’m sure you’re really busy getting Even accustomed…”_

_Even nods, “Tomorrow morning sounds great.”_

_“Cool!” Vilde smiles. “Can’t wait.”_

Even pulls Isak out of his thoughts by lacing their fingers together and bringing their flying bodies closer together in the air. “Penny for your thoughts?” He asks, over the sound of the bustling village below and the whistling wind around them.

“Just thinking about you,” Isak says honestly, and he laughs when Even rolls his eyes. “I’m serious! I was thinking about when you met Vilde for the first time, and how much she loved you.”

Isak watches as Even’s cheeks go pink, or at least, pinker than they already were due to the wind against their faces. “You were right about her, she makes amazing cakes. And I’d never heard of having a blueberry cake before,” he admits, and Isak nods. Even had told him that already, back when they first got the blueberry cake (and ate it within the hour, maybe even within the half hour). “I can tell how much you two love each other. It makes me happy to know that you’ve had that kind of support system.”

“Don’t be jealous,” Isak teases, but it’s only because he doesn’t really know how to react to that. Of course he loves Vilde, it’s just the act of actually, like, _admitting_ it that makes him a little squirmy in his stomach.

“Jealous? Me? Please, I’m the least jealous person you’ll ever meet.”

Isak rolls his eyes. “Yeah, sure. That’s why you practically eye fucked me—and practically eye murdered the cashier—at the store yesterday?”

“He offered you sunflower seeds!” Even defends weakly. “It sounded like a euphemism!”

“Even, we’re less than six inches tall and we live in the forest. We eat sunflower seeds.”

“Well, I know that now.”

Isak rolls his eyes again, but it’s softened by the fond look in his eyes that he knows is there. They’re quiet for the rest of the fly to Isak’s mum’s, which isn’t that long anyway, but is long enough to give Isak more time to think. He thinks about a lot of things. He’s had a lot more to think about recently, though, now that Even is here. Some good, some bad, as it goes; but nothing he would change.

Marianne’s cottage is tucked in between two cherry blossom trees. Isak always loved those trees when he was growing up, because they’d bloom bright pink in the summer. When there was wind, the flowers fall like pink snow, like a springtime wonderland instead of a winter wonderland. The pink blossoms only lasted through the spring, but Isak never minded. It gave him something to look forward to.

They land on her walkway, a winding path of acrylic stones that she’d stolen from a craft store when she was Isak’s age and reckless enough to go into the human city. In retrospect, Isak supposes he got his wanderlust from her. That side of him is something the fairies always tried to shame him for, and he attributes his pride to his mother, because she’s the one who taught him that it’s okay to be different. That different is just a word developed by a society that wants to normalize things, to put people in boxes in they don’t belong in, to set standards that have no logical basis.

Looking at his childhood home makes him nostalgic every time. Not for living here, because he’s free to come and go as he likes, but for being young and carefree and dancing among cherry blossoms. He doesn’t remember the last time he let go like that. But the trees will bloom in a month, and he makes a mental note to bring Even back (if everything goes well) so they can make some new memories.

“When I was younger, like 5 or 6 years old, a fairy ring grew back behind the house,” he tells Even, who’s fidgeting nervously. “You know what that is, right? A circle of mushrooms? They’re not actually used by fairies for anything. They’re not guarded by giant bug-eyed toads, they’re not burned into the ground by dancing elves, and as you can tell, they don’t mark underground fairy villages. They just form because the mushrooms are searching for food underground. But I went on them and was jumping from toadstool to toadstool, going round and round in circles until I fell off of them too many times to get back up. My mum had to carry me inside because I was so tired and bruised. The next day, I woke up and found that she’d cut all the mushrooms down and sold the majority of them to the markets for food. I cried for a solid two hours over it.”

Even chuckles. “I always sort of wondered if fairy rings actually meant anything to fairies. Like if you used them as seating for council meetings or something, you know?” A smirk crosses his face as he knocks his shoulder into Isak’s. “Although now I know they’re used to shield irresponsible fairies from toddlers exploring the woods.”

“I knew I would regret telling you about that!” Isak groans, shoving at Even’s chest. But Even just catches his wrists, and pulls him in for a kiss. Who is Isak to resist that? “It’s gonna be okay,” Isak mumbles against Even’s lips, after a few moments of gentle pecks. “She’s gonna love you, I promise. I know you’re worried, I can see it in your face.”

Even smiles gently, pulling back only to smooth his thumb on the skin under Isak’s right eye. “What did I do to deserve you?” Even murmurs.

“You didn’t have to _do_ anything to deserve me. We deserve each other because we do. No strings attached.”

“Sap,” Even teases, leaning in for another kiss.

Their lips barely get the chance to touch before they’re interrupted by the door squeaking open. Even practically jumps backwards, and Isak laughs when he sees the bright red blush on his boyfriend’s cheeks. Isak’s mother, now standing on the front porch, also seems amused at Even’s embarrassment.

“Hi, mum,” he smiles, flying over the walkway and landing a few steps in front of her before finally closing the distance so he can give her a hug. She falls into it easily, holding him like he might disappear if she lets go, and Isak can’t help the guilt that fills his stomach at the thought. “This is Even,” he says, to distract himself from any rising emotions. Even was now standing just behind them, cheeks still bright red and face still betraying his embarrassment.

Marianne smiles, opening her arms again. Even steps into them. It’s a little awkward with the height difference–Even was tall, even as a fairy–but neither of them seem to mind all that much, not even Even, who normally bitches about having to stoop down to retrieve things in Isak’s house.

“It’s so nice to finally meet you,” she smiles, pulling away from Even to look at him properly. “Isak’s told me so much about you.”

“Has he?” Even asks, eyes flickering to Isak’s. Isak knows the question without Even having to verbalize it, but apparently, so does Marianne.

“Yes, I know that you were a human. Isak told me everything,” she clarifies.

Even nods. “Oh. Well, okay. I, um… I’m not—”

“You’re not a bad guy? I know. If you were, you wouldn’t be here right now, and I wouldn’t have walked out to see you two kissing.” She holds up her hand before Even can apologize. “Don’t worry about it. Isak’s old enough to kiss whoever he wants, he doesn’t need permission and neither do you. Now, I know spring starts in a week, but it’s still cold out here. Let’s go inside. You two, go wash up.”

Isak takes Even’s hand, leading him inside and towards his childhood room. The whole house smells like freshly baked bread and fresh fruits, and Isak’s mouth waters almost instantly. He doesn’t miss Ramen noodles as much as he thought he would, not when he can pop over to his mum’s and have freshly churned butter, or cream, or milk, or Vilde’s blueberry cakes. God, Vilde’s blueberry cakes.

Everything in his room is basically the same as it was when he moved out. His sheets are still blue and white, his windowsill is still littered with random knickknacks. There’s even a small stuffed teddy bear on the bed, one that his father had handcrafted for him, back before everything happened. Before he left.

“Bathroom’s right here,” he says, tearing his eyes away from the teddy bear and walking to his bathroom. They take turns washing their hands at the small sink. The soap is clearly old and barely used, but it smells like the herbs his mum grows in her garden, fresh and alive, earthy in the best way.

They linger in Isak’s bedroom afterwards, sitting on Isak’s small, creaky bed. “I can imagine a tiny little Isak sitting in this bed and looking out that window, trying to count stars through the trees,” Even murmurs, turning to look at Isak.

Isak doesn’t look back. “Can you imagine a tiny little Isak sitting in this bed and listening to his parents scream at each other down the hall?” He murmurs. It’s quiet for a few moment, but warm hands slide around his waist, pulling him closer. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to—”

“Don’t be sorry, baby,” Even whispers, dodging Isak’s wings in order to press a small kiss to the nape of Isak’s neck.

“It’s just that being here, in my room, I just… I don’t have many good memories in here. This is where I hid when I was scared, or sad, or when I saw a cute boy at school and I thought that if I looked at my mum she’d see the word _homosexual_ written across my forehead. I don’t know, it’s stupid.”

“It’s not.”

Isak rolls over to face Even, and feels his bad mood melt just upon looking at him. Even has that way about him, a way that makes you feel like he can fix everything, or will at least try his best to fix everything, if only you ask him to. Isak would never ask that of him, but sometimes he thinks that Even doesn’t wait to be asked, not for Isak. He knows when Isak needs to do things for himself and he knows when Isak needs help, and he’s always more than willing to do both. Isak wishes he could be that for Even, too. Even deserves that.

“You don’t have to _do_ anything to deserve me,” Even says, and for a moment, Isak is convinced that Even can read minds or some shit. Even notices Isak’s bewildered expression and laughs, cupping his cheek gently. “You didn’t even realize that you said that out loud, did you?”

“Oh. No,” Isak admits, blushing. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry.” He smooths his fingertips over Isak’s skin, leaning forward to press their lips together. They make out there, in Isak’s bed, the same bed that he tried (and succeeded) to overcome his internalized homophobia. It feels like closure, like the full stop at the end of a run-on sentence, when the reader can finally stop and take a breath before moving on to the next chapter.

“I love you,” Isak murmurs, when they pull apart.

Even smiles. “I love you.” He kisses Isak again, and then gently taps his nose with his finger. “So, I do have one question.”

“Hm?”

He points over Isak’s shoulder to a display case full of human teeth. “What the actual living fuck is that?”

“The teeth?” Isak asks, and Even nods. “Have you never heard of the tooth fairy?”

Silence. And then—

“ _The tooth fairy is real?!_ ”

“Surprise!” Isak jokes, laughing when Even tackles him to the bed and demands an explanation. “Our village is right on the edge of a human city! Some of the fairies work as tooth fairies, including my mom. She worked as one back when I was younger. And after my dad left, she didn’t have a babysitter, so I went with her. Those are the teeth she let me collect. Cool, aren’t they?”

Even blinks. “Uh, no?! My whole life has been a lie! Is Santa real, too?”

“Now, that, I don’t know. Fairies don’t celebrate Christmas.”

“Oh, my god. My life has been altered forever.”

“Hey, apply for the job and then you’ll get to do it.”

“I might have to fucking do that!”

“Boys!” They hear, interrupting their moment. Though the pleasant haze is broken, the warm feelings linger. “Come eat, before your food gets cold!”

When they emerge from the safety of Isak’s room, Isak isn’t worried about the word _homosexual_ being written across his forehead. Who cares if it is? Not only does his mum already know, but she accepts him, openly and unabashedly, and that’s what’s different this time around. That’s what’s better this time around.

They sit down at the table, surrounded by lit candles and freshly picked wildflowers. There’s a spread of bread and cakes and cream and butter, and some venison, because although fairies don’t eat meat that often, she knows that Even is still coming off of a human diet and needs more than a mere 3 months to adjust. Isak’s heart warms at the thought that his mum thought of Even and what Even would not only want, but what Even would need. The emotions start to resurface and he reaches to put his hand on Even’s thigh, sighing heavily when Even immediately places his hand on top of Isak’s.

“Was the transition difficult?” His mum is asking Even, who’s shaking his head and explaining that everything is easier with Isak. That he never regretted a thing.

_“Even, I know you love theatrics, but it’s fucking freezing out here so can you please hurry the fuck up?” Isak begs, rubbing his arms while Even stares down at the spell book like he doesn’t know how to read it._

_Even rolls his eyes. “Such high maintenance. Don’t make me regret this decision,” he teases, and Isak flips him off. “I’m only joking, babe. Of course being with you will make me the happiest man in the world, even if you’re being prissy.” He clears his throat and starts reading the spell, and Isak tunes out for most of it. It’s a long ass spell and Isak doesn’t really care to hear it, instead he’s focusing on not letting his body get too cold._

_With a bright flash of light and a pop that sounds like a firecracker, Even as Isak knows him is gone. When he looks next, Even—naked as the day he was born—is standing five inches tall in front of him. Isak’s eyes immediately fill with tears over just how beautiful Even is. He’s still the same lean, pale, lanky boy that Isak loves; but he’s got wings now, shaped like those of an angel, clear but almost opaque so they look like shimmering white, like freshly fallen snow in the silver sun of the morning._

_“Isak,” he hears, and the next thing he knows, he’s throwing himself into Even’s arms. “Isak, baby, stop crying. It’s okay.”_

_“I love you,” Isak cries, holding on tighter. He feels Even shaking, and he wonders if he’s crying too, before he remembers that it’s January. “Oh! Right, fuck, you must be freezing. Here.” He pulls back and hands Even clothes, helping him put them on. “It’ll take you a while to get used to those wings, but before long you’ll forget they’re there.”_

_Even scoffs. “Trust me. I won’t ever forget they’re there.” He flutters then once, experimentally, and then laughs brightly. “Look, baby, I’m a fairy!”_

_“I know,” Isak smiles, laughing around the tears. “I know. You’re so pretty.”_

_Even beams, reaching forward to pull Isak into another hug. Isak doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to feeling wings under his hands when he hugs Even, but he doesn’t mind. He loves every inch of Even, unapologetically, for now and forever._

“I don’t know if Isak’s told you,” Marianne continues, as Isak shifts to lace his fingers with Even’s under the table, “but when I was his age, I went to the city. I found a spellbook in the library and turned myself into a human for the day, then used the book to turn myself into a fairy again the next morning so I could come home.”

“Isak’s never told me that,” Even says, glancing over at Isak.

“Isak never told you because Isak had no idea there was a spellbook involved in that endeavor.”

Marianne smiles, wicked and mischievous, and for a beat, Isak thinks he sees a 16 year old girl sitting there in front of them, wild and full of wanderlust. It almost looks like himself. “Yep. I stole the book from the bookkeeper’s private office. I imagine they didn’t want people dealing in black magic, but they didn’t do a good enough job of hiding it. Didn’t take me any time at all to find it. After I became human I used some pixie dust to make it human sized, but I didn’t bring enough to make it fairy sized. So I left it in some old antique shop, tucked under this porcelain replica fairy cottage. Figured there was some poetry in it.” She pops a small biscuit in her mouth, coated in her freshly churned butter.

“Wait,” Even says, and Isak notices the way the grip on his fingers has gotten tighter. “In _Grandmother’s Living Room_?” Marianne nods. “That’s...where I found the spellbook I used to become a fairy.”

“What?” Isak says, at the same time his mum says,

“You’re having me on.”

Even shakes his head, his eyes wide. “Not at all. I was...I looked everywhere for something like that. I can’t believe it was yours.” He smiles. “Or, well, that it was the bookkeeper’s.”

“Do you have it?”

Isak nods, this time. “I made it fairy sized, so he can use it whenever he goes to visit his family. But if it’s…”

“We should take it back to the bookkeeper!” Even exclaims.

Marianne stands up, her knees hitting the table so hard that everything clatters. “We have to get there before it closes. It closes early on Sundays.” She smiles at the both of them, warm but still just as mischievous as she’s always been. “This is like an ending to a fairy tale. One of you should make a movie out of it someday.”

“I will,” Even says, standing up too. “You know what I’ll call it?”

“What?” Isak asks, wiping his mouth with his napkin and standing up, too. They all walk outside, getting ready to fly against the cold.

Even kisses his cheek, smiling brightly, so brightly that Isak knows he’s about to get roasted. He squints at Even dangerously, almost challengingly, like he’s daring Even to say it.

“The Boy Who Couldn’t Fly In The Rain.”

With that, Even takes off, a trail of glitter in his wake as he follows Marianne to Isak’s, so they can get the spellbook. Isak can’t wipe the smile off his face as he watches Even go, as he watches Even fly.

As he watches Even fly _home_. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you to everyone who read and commented and left kudos and overall supported this! i got a bit caught up with life but im pretty satisfied with the ending, and i hope you are too. 
> 
> find me on tumblr @femmevilde

**Author's Note:**

> dedicated to all my friends at fwn who kept telling me to write it (and who never got mad at me when i did anything but)
> 
> find me on tumblr: femmevilde


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